Education Not Sanctions Needed

Member for Lingiari and Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Indigenous Affairs and Northern Australia Warren Snowdon today warned Indigenous Affairs Minister Mal Brough against a 'one size fits all' approach to Indigenous welfare.

Mr Snowdon said he was particularly concerned about proposals for compulsorily debiting funds from the incomes of people whose behaviour is identified as putting their families at risk.

'There's nothing wrong with a debit system as such,' he said.

'It's working in communities right across the Territory, where people use the debit system at Centrelink for managing and budgeting family finances for such things as school breakfasts and lunches, rent and food.

'The key to this approach is that it is voluntary, it's non-judgmental and it incorporates education to help people live within very limited budgets.

'The 'one size fits all' approach appears to be the only way that the current regime in Canberra can deal with complex issues, but it has grave problems.

'The fact that it would be compulsory is one; and another is that it happens in a vacuum in which governments still refuse to recognise the dimensions of Indigenous poverty.

'There have been, I understand, efforts to develop appropriate and relevant financial education but these need to be locally targeted and they need to deal with varying literacy levels.

'The way in which this whole debate has been framed is another problem, because it singles out a distinct and dysfunctional minority as characterising broader behaviour among Aboriginal people and it's punitive in its response to their plight.

'I can't see any government proposing to deal in this way with similar dysfunction in the broader community – where it is more widespread - and I don't see why they should single out Aboriginal people for this treatment.

'Let's deal with the problems, certainly, but we don't need the big stick approach.

'We're talking about people who are dirt poor and education and collaboration is going to work much better with them than sanctions any day,' Mr Snowdon said.

2006-05-03