Antinuclear

Aboriginal homelands vulnerable to land grab, as Northern Territory Intervention is widened

As part of the 2007 “intervention” legislation, Aboriginal land granted under the 1976 Land Rights Act was compulsorily acquired by the government through five-year leases. These will be replaced with “voluntary” forty-year leases that remove all previous restrictions on how town camp and “Community Living” land could be used. 

Over the past four years the government has attempted to press local communities to sign long-term leases by cutting funds for essential services to the homeland communities.

Australia: Labor to extend NT “intervention” for a decade, World Socialist Website, By Susan Allan, 12 December 2011 The Labor government of Prime Minister Julia Gillard is intensifying its social austerity cutbacks with a raft of proposed new laws that continue the Northern Territory (NT) “intervention” for another ten years and expand its punitive measures to include all welfare recipients, indigenous and non-indigenous alike, Australia-wide.

First enacted in 2007 by the Howard Liberal-National government, the
Northern Territory National Emergency Response, or “intervention,”
suspended the Racial Discrimination Act in the Territory and imposed a
series of anti-democratic measures against Aboriginal welfare
recipients and their communities.
While specifically targetting the NT’s indigenous population, the
laws, which were backed by the Labor opposition, were the first stage
in an assault on the entire social welfare system. (See: “The
Aboriginal ‘intervention’ in Australia: four years on”)
The latest chapter in this regressive program involves three separate
laws: the Stronger Futures in the Northern Territory Bill 2011, the
Stronger Futures in the Northern Territory (Consequential and
Transitional Provisions) Bill 2011 and the Social Security Legislation
Amendment Bill 2011……

As part of the 2007 “intervention” legislation, Aboriginal land
granted under the 1976 Land Rights Act was compulsorily acquired by
the government through five-year leases. These will be replaced with
“voluntary” forty-year leases that remove all previous restrictions on
how town camp and “Community Living” land could be used. Over the past
four years the government has attempted to press local communities to
sign long-term leases by cutting funds for essential services to the
homeland communities.
The Community Development Employment Program (CDEP) will be completely
eliminated in 2012. Labor claims this below-poverty-line,
work-for-the-dole program, which provides the only work in many
Aboriginal communities, will be replaced by “real” jobs. More than
8,000 CDEP jobs have been axed since the intervention began,
shattering remote Aboriginal communities and forcing residents into
already overcrowded town camps in NT towns and cities. While CDEP
currently employs more than 7,500 people, Labor’s new intervention
measures will provide just 50 new ranger positions, 100 traineeships
and some public service jobs for indigenous students who complete Year
12, but only in so-called “Territory Growth” towns…..
While a growing list of Aboriginal health and welfare organisations,
academics and lawyers have denounced Labor’s planned intervention
legislation, the Gillard government will not change course….
In the first three months since Labor’s May budget and its “tough-love”
approach to welfare, more than 20,000 unemployed Aboriginal people
have had their welfare payments suspended. This amounts to 20 percent
of all Aboriginal people on welfare. Nationally, 10 percent of all
unemployed have incurred suspensions…..
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/dec2011/inte-d12.shtml

December 14, 2011 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | aboriginal issues, AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, Northern Territory