Governnment Must Make Indigenous Summit Inclusive, Relevant and Meaningful

Dr Haikerwal said the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, Mal Brough, should learn from the breadth and depth of experts and first-hand evidence and experience on show at today's Indigenous Forum at Parliament House, Canberra, and expand the scope of the Government's Summit accordingly.

Hosted by Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation (ANTaR) and the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC), today's Forum features speakers who currently work in successful community health and welfare programs that aim to improve health and end violence in Indigenous communities.

"While today's Forum is driven by first-hand experience from the troubled communities, the Government's Summit, as it stands, has a very narrow focus that gives it little chance of coming out with practical solutions," Dr Haikerwal said.

"For a start, there is no Indigenous representation on the Summit and the agenda is limited to law enforcement and compulsion - a hardline agenda reinforced by the attendance of the Attorney-General and the Justice Minister.

"In order for the Summit to be seen as a serious attempt to fix things, it needs to look at all the social and economic factors that impact on Indigenous communities. More importantly, the Summit should be built around the views and experiences of the Indigenous people who live and work in the troubled communities.

"This is the only way that the Summit can be seen in a different light to the numerous other Government Forums and Summits over the last decade that have produced very little of substance," Dr Haikerwal said.

In May, the AMA called for a Royal Commission into Indigenous communities. At the same time, the AMA Federal Council passed a resolution for an Indigenous Summit, which read:

That the AMA call on Federal and State Governments to:

• hold an urgent summit on the crisis in Indigenous social issues within the next three months and produce an action plan based on current knowledge
• include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander participation in the summit as well as groups providing services to these communities
• announce their plans at the conclusion of the summit for immediate attention to these issues, and projected outcomes by the end of 2007.

Dr Haikerwal said the AMA would like to see the principles and intent of this resolution applied to next week's Summit to ensure there are concrete commitments to be achieved by the end of 2007 and a bipartisan agreement to achieve these goals.