Antinuclear

Corporate wealth for some but the majority poorer The Stringer by Gerry Georgatos October 11th, 2014  Western Australia and the Northern Territory have the worst poverty and homelessness figures for First Peoples but WA and the NT are not only Australia’s wealthiest jurisdictions, they are among the world’s wealthiest. Meanwhile poverty among First Peoples has got worse than ever before and more extensive. Governments have claimed that they are finding ways to support impoverished First Peoples, and in supposedly spreading the wealth by supporting some into big business. But if this is true why is so much going wrong in these two jurisdictions where one would presume because of the levels of sovereign wealth so much should be going right?……

 according to the Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations, mining is returning millions to Aboriginal owned corporations. Western Australia’s Pilbara is the engine room of the nation’s mining boom. But the two billion years old 400,000 square kilometres Pilbara is home to some pretty sad poverty, all of it First Peoples – Roebourne and Wickham for starters, and any of the cluster of communities around Marble Bar, Tom Price, Nullogine, Port Hedland.

Port Hedland is Australia’s busiest port, with ships leaving daily filled with iron ore extracted from Aboriginal land but with the profits returned to multinationals – next-to-nothing for the communities where many of the native title claimants live . Native title owners? A fool’s gold many say.

But if not billions of dollars there are millions of dollars going the way of Aboriginal corporations.

According to the Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations, Western Australia’s Aboriginal corporations resulted in a total combined income of $502.7 million in 2012-13. Ironically, there has been a rise of Aboriginal corporate revenue while at the same time homelessness and poverty have become more acute and extensive, while jail and suicide rates have skyrocketed. …….

There is no legitimate blueprint of how the mining wealth should holistically lift communities out of poverty, how to help all of the people. Instead in a wild west like roadshow a trickle of the mining wealth is being tapped into for individual corporate benefit but not for holistic returns to communities. Native title is a debacle when everyone can see that the engine rooms of the mining wealth of this continent are failing holistically First Peoples communities……

The average revenue of the 500 largest Aboriginal corporations for the financial year 2012-13 was $7.1 million, double the average income of the 500 largest corporations across the nation. Some have got wealthy, and that is fine if this is the way it was meant to be, but this is not the way it was sold. Instead of communities flourishing in the ways forward, in improving economic and social development, in their rise of the cultural tools, in the best of two worlds, many more people than ever before are hitting rock bottom, disenfranchised from both worlds. The idea of corporations doing the right thing by communities at all times, with a standard all should follow is just not happening. The idea that miners and this new layer of Aboriginal corporates that they will lift all of the people out of poverty and out of the corrals of human misery built by Australia’s apartheid has not occurred and will never occur. Land use payments, mining royalties, donations are so low that they were destined to fail, and when there is no surety of whatever little is agreed on is to be distributed holistically, equally then of course people will miss out. There have been more than 900 Indigenous land use agreements (ILUAs) and thereabouts 300 native title federal determinations. Where are we today? In worse poverty than ever before……..

The average revenue of the 500 largest Aboriginal corporations for the financial year 2012-13 was $7.1 million, double the average income of the 500 largest corporations across the nation. Some have got wealthy, and that is fine if this is the way it was meant to be, but this is not the way it was sold. Instead of communities flourishing in the ways forward, in improving economic and social development, in their rise of the cultural tools, in the best of two worlds, many more people than ever before are hitting rock bottom, disenfranchised from both worlds. The idea of corporations doing the right thing by communities at all times, with a standard all should follow is just not happening. The idea that miners and this new layer of Aboriginal corporates that they will lift all of the people out of poverty and out of the corrals of human misery built by Australia’s apartheid has not occurred and will never occur. Land use payments, mining royalties, donations are so low that they were destined to fail, and when there is no surety of whatever little is agreed on is to be distributed holistically, equally then of course people will miss out. There have been more than 900 Indigenous land use agreements (ILUAs) and thereabouts 300 native title federal determinations. Where are we today? In worse poverty than ever before………

The Northern Territory Government has invested more than $100 million in the last year in resources exploration. The Northern Territory’s homelessness rate, just about all of it First People, is at 730 per 10,000 according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, while the national rate is 49 per 100,000. Australia-wide, the homeless rate for First People is at 200 per 10,000.

The crisis level rise in poverty, homelessness, imprisonment, suicide among First People cannot be addressed by the rise of Aboriginal corporate wealth. The rise in poverty, homelessness, imprisonment, suicide is also in huge part the result of the rapacious mining and in huge part the result of the weaknesses of the Native Title Act and of the National Native Title Tribunal. Far too many communities are pushed around, closed down, moved off their Country into corrals, and then ripped off by both Governments and miners. Then they are let down by Aboriginal Corporations which have assimilated into highly paid executives and predominately self-serving organisations. The blueprint should be one where it is a must-do to deal with the communities as a whole, where benefits are returned holistically and immediately to all of the people. This is not simplistic. It is the way it should be.

People should not have to go cap in hand to their native title prescribed body corporates, to Aboriginal corporations, with head bowed, and beg for money for fuel and food. http://thestringer.com.au/corporate-wealth-for-some-but-the-majority-poorer-8815#.VDnGDGddUnk