AUSTRALIA 
Government rules out intervention in SA
Thursday, 8 May, 2008
Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin. (AAP)
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The federal government has ruled out an immediate emergency intervention in South Australian indigenous lands, despite a study found 14 per cent of children there had been sexually abused.
The commonwealth and South Australian government today rejected calls to intervene in SA's Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara
(APY) Lands, as the previous Howard government did in troubled Northern Territory indigenous communities.
The federal and state opposition today called for an intervention in the APY Lands following a report which revealed at least 141 of the 1,000-strong child population had been sexually assaulted.
The report, by former Supreme Court judge Ted Mullighan, found children had been selling sex for drugs, petrol and cash on the lands, in the state's far north.
But a spokeswoman for federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin today said the government's initial response was announcing $19 million in funding for a range of initiatives, including money for a new police station.
The Howard government intervened last year in Northern Territory indigenous communities following a report which exposed similar abuse.
The author of that report, Rex Wild QC, said the APY Lands report was the fifth such report to identify the same problems in indigenous communities.
"It's about time somebody put them all together and said `there is a problem right around Australia ... let's resolve it for the whole of Australia, not just piecemeal'," he told ABC radio.
Federal opposition indigenous affairs spokesman Tony Abbott said the same problem required the same response.
"If the intervention was right in the territory, it should also be right in the APY Lands," Mr Abbott said.
"I think what should happen now urgently is the federal and South Australian governments should announce an intervention-like response.
"And if (Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny) Macklin is serious about supporting the intervention in the territory she will support something very much like the intervention in South Australia."
The architect of the Howard government's NT takeover, former indigenous affairs minister Mal Brough, was critical of the response of both the federal and SA governments to the APY Lands report.
"If they had uncovered 140-something children that had been sexually abused in a white community would this be the response, or would it be more fulsome and more urgent?" Mr Brough said.
South Australian Liberal leader Martin Hamilton-Smith called for an immediate state intervention, saying the Rann Labor government should place more police, medical and child protection workers in
APY Lands communities within three weeks, not three months as
Premier Mike Rann had indicated.
But state Aboriginal Affairs Minister Jay Weatherill said Mr Mullighan didn't endorse an intervention in his 46 recommendations.
"Quite the contrary, his first recommendation was about if you want long-term sustainable change you have got to work with communities and find strength within them, rather than the sort of approach we have seen by the Howard government's intervention in the NT," Mr Weatherill said.
Source: AAP
The commonwealth and South Australian government today rejected calls to intervene in SA's Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara
(APY) Lands, as the previous Howard government did in troubled Northern Territory indigenous communities.
The federal and state opposition today called for an intervention in the APY Lands following a report which revealed at least 141 of the 1,000-strong child population had been sexually assaulted.
The report, by former Supreme Court judge Ted Mullighan, found children had been selling sex for drugs, petrol and cash on the lands, in the state's far north.
But a spokeswoman for federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin today said the government's initial response was announcing $19 million in funding for a range of initiatives, including money for a new police station.
The Howard government intervened last year in Northern Territory indigenous communities following a report which exposed similar abuse.
The author of that report, Rex Wild QC, said the APY Lands report was the fifth such report to identify the same problems in indigenous communities.
"It's about time somebody put them all together and said `there is a problem right around Australia ... let's resolve it for the whole of Australia, not just piecemeal'," he told ABC radio.
Federal opposition indigenous affairs spokesman Tony Abbott said the same problem required the same response.
"If the intervention was right in the territory, it should also be right in the APY Lands," Mr Abbott said.
"I think what should happen now urgently is the federal and South Australian governments should announce an intervention-like response.
"And if (Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny) Macklin is serious about supporting the intervention in the territory she will support something very much like the intervention in South Australia."
The architect of the Howard government's NT takeover, former indigenous affairs minister Mal Brough, was critical of the response of both the federal and SA governments to the APY Lands report.
"If they had uncovered 140-something children that had been sexually abused in a white community would this be the response, or would it be more fulsome and more urgent?" Mr Brough said.
South Australian Liberal leader Martin Hamilton-Smith called for an immediate state intervention, saying the Rann Labor government should place more police, medical and child protection workers in
APY Lands communities within three weeks, not three months as
Premier Mike Rann had indicated.
But state Aboriginal Affairs Minister Jay Weatherill said Mr Mullighan didn't endorse an intervention in his 46 recommendations.
"Quite the contrary, his first recommendation was about if you want long-term sustainable change you have got to work with communities and find strength within them, rather than the sort of approach we have seen by the Howard government's intervention in the NT," Mr Weatherill said.
Source: AAP