Howard's "land grab" of Aboriginal settlements. Is it wrong?

I know what I believe. I believe that John Howard is taking control of land in Aboriginal Settlements for reasons other than the stated reason - of preventing child abuse. It is all too far-fetched to be true.

John Howard does not agree with me. Well, of course he doesn't. But at least he has been forced now to come out and deny the story - for what a Prime Ministerial denial is worth, from John Howard.

The SMH said (30 June 2007) : "The Prime Minister, John Howard, has dismissed as "ludicrous" allegations his plan to tackle child abuse in indigenous communities in the Northern Territory was a cover-up for winding back land rights.
"Earlier this week Pat Turner, a former head of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, accused the Federal Government of using child abuse as "the Trojan Horse to resume total control of our land".
"Mr Howard said he was not "trying to take anything from anybody". "This idea that we're stealing a generation - we're protecting a generation; this idea we're grabbing land - we're trying to secure the future for these people." - end of quote.

OK, why is John Howard resuming control of Aboriginal Leases? What has this process got to do with stopping child abuse? It is far from clear what the rationale is.

It is not just the "prattling classes" of the "Blogosphere" who think there is a problem with the Howard plan. Even nice, conservative, reasonable Michael Duffy thinks there is.

He writes (SMH 30 June 2007) "For 11 years this Government largely ignored the horrific plight of so many Aboriginal Australians. (It says it's acting now because of a recent report on child sex abuse. Many reports have said the same things over the past decade.)"
Good point, Michael.

His article is entitled: "Lessons from Iraq absent in (sic) PM's solution" (Michael is not a good grammarian - absent from would be better, Michael.). He starts off:

"The invasion of the Northern Territory proceeds well. Convoys have been dispatched, beachheads secured, and our television screens again show armed Australians in uniform being nice to shoeless children of colour.

"On the home front, the white feather is being used to ridicule dissenters. The modern version of the white feather is the claim, as put by the Indigenous Affairs Minister, Mal Brough, on The 7.30 Report on Wednesday, that those who question any aspect of what the Government is doing are really saying "let's do nothing".

"So all in all, John Howard's military solution to the problem of Aboriginal disadvantage is going well. But then, wars do tend to go well in their early stages."

And what do I think is behind it? Mining interests, and a deep-seated desire to destabilise the Northern Territory Government, and a desire to make himself look "decisive" in the lead-up to the forthcoming election. Why do I mention mining interests? Well, one of the key ingredients in the plan is this:

"Introduce legislation to acquire a five year lease over prescribed Indigenous communities, with just terms compensation with this to include, but not be limited to, communities of 100 people or more located on:
Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976 (ALRA) land;
located on a form of freehold title issued by the NT Government to Aboriginal corporations and known as Community Living Areas.
Other communities may also be prescribed by the Minister on the basis of advice from the Taskforce."
Source: Mal Brough's Press Statement of 21 June 2007.

This constitutes a key part of the Federal Government's on-going war against Native Title. They are desperate to disrupt Native Title, and replace it with 99 year leases. Why? Because it makes it easier for Mining interests to negotiate mining activities.

Why else?

This has little if anything to do with abuse of Aboriginal children. In fact, the removal of the permit system, if anything, facilitates abuse - at least the prostitution of children by outsiders, (e.g., mine workers and taxi-drivers) in return for drugs, and sniffable petrol, which was clearly identified in the "Little Children are Sacred" report. Be prepared - it is a huge file. But this website seems to work. The NT Government website which is the official host site appears to have crashed.

Finally, I note that the authors of this report (Pat Anderson and Rex Wild QC) state:
"It is critical that both Governments (NT and Federal) commit to genuine consultation with Aboriginal people in designing initiatives for Aboriginal communities" P7.

That sentence is in the Foreword of the Report, Mr Brough, in case you have not read that far into it.

NSW has a weird view of land rights.

The Sydney Morning Herald has a poorly written piece today. Are all SMH journalists as uncritical as Andrew Clennell? His piece was entitled "Native title deal after 11 years". Look at the whole article before proceeding.

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Here is an annotated version of this article - which I was sent by a friend. I think it warrants being published in its own right. (The comments in red are not from the original published article - but that will be self-evident.)

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Native title deal after 11 years

TWO native title deals - including the biggest ever settled in NSW - are to be announced by the State Government before the election in March.

Depending on your point of view:- this is an announcement so you will be ready and waiting when we do make an announcement, or - the more likely reason - we want two bites at the PR cherry, the now and the photo opportunity later when everyone is back from the beach/Thailand/Bali/New York

The Government confirmed yesterday that it would approve the biggest native title claim, with the Githabul people in an area north of Tenterfield, next month.

We want every blackfella in NSW and all members of ANTAR to recognise what we are doing for Aboriginal people

It is also about to settle a claim with the Arakwal people, near Byron Bay.

Ditto

The native title claimants gave up the fight for freehold title to make the deals possible.

We didn't teach the A Team to negotiate like Keating did, so if they don't like the deal they only have themselves to blame.

The Premier, Morris Iemma, is expected to attend a ceremony at Toonumbar dam in the state's north-east on February 28 to settle the Githabul people's 11-year-old claim.

We have looked up the SOI and consulted Phil Koperberg and decided that there will be neither rain nor bushfire in the vicinity so have decided that this will be the best day and the best light for the aforesaid photo opportunity. The date is probably as close as we can get to Election Day and still allow time for the good news of our good deed to sink in and to allow the voting public to study Morrie's picture so they can identify him.

Settling the claim will give the local Aboriginal corporation about 120 hectares of land, allow Aborigines to hunt for turtles and give them a say over the handling of national parks and state forests. It should also provide job opportunities for Aboriginal people with the National Parks and Wildlife Service.

Read aforesaid comments on negotiating skills and techniques. Haven't checked to see if there are turtles there. EPA keeping its fingers crossed that turtles do better in the vicinity of Toonumbar dam than Sydney Rock Oyster farms have done. And, yeah, the blackfellas will get a say over how to open the gates to the national parks and state forests but we'll decide how much money and to whom the money flows from aforesaid national parks and state forests. For job opportunities for Aboriginal people with the National Parks and Wildlife Service see aforesaid sentence.

The deal is largely restricted to 70,000 hectares of national park and state forest land and will not affect farmland.

We are not putting up with the aggravation from all those rural whingers in the Western Division like the Feds did with Mabo. And of course, we - the government, ahem, the people of NSW actually control the national parks and the state forests so no one will notice anything different. All photo opps and no aggravation.

The director-general of the NSW Department of Lands, Warwick Watkins, said yesterday a final settlement was also expected before March with the Arakwal people. In 2001, the Government announced that it would negotiate with them about how the national park there would be used, but there has been a further claim, which is about to be settled.

Ditto. Ditto. Ditto.

Trevor Close, the native title claimant for the Githabul land, which extends from Tenterfield to Kyogle, said Aboriginal people got "very little" out of the deal other than the right to hunt turtles and a say in how the national parks were run.

Please note above.

However, he was happy to see it resolved after 11 years of negotiations.

Wasn't getting anywhere anyway, so we are trying to walk away from the lack of negotiating table with some dignity still intact.

"A lot of people think it's a great deal," he said, "but they don't actually see how much the Githabul gave up - we moved a hell of a lot to get this deal."

Some of us thought some sort of deal signed, sealed and delivered to-day would be better than nothing and might let us have an opportunity to try again another day.

Mr Watkins agreed the deal was largely symbolic, but said it was important spiritually to Aboriginal people and similar to a native title agreement reached over Crown land covering Perth several years ago.

See above and ditto. We don't really believe in this spiritual stuff but they reckon they do so there's nothing in it for us and doesn't cost us much so we're letting 'em, have a bit of a dreamtime.

The National Party leader, Andrew Stoner, said that the native title agreement was an "obvious vote-buying exercise in the lead-up to the March state election".

How dare they pinch our template for doing deals with blackfellas if and when we get to government.

He said greater involvement of Aboriginal people in the management of the areas was "likely to result in a more commonsense approach than the extreme green approach taken by the NSW Labor Government".

And you say I'm colour blind if I think Morrie Iemma and the socialists are extreme green. I'll have you know that green is my favourite colour but only the green on the National Party website and election posters and advertising - and, of course, when we are wearing it with our Irish Catholic neighbours at the various St Pat's Day races around country NSW.

PS: Just remember this is democracy in action - there are plenty of dictatorships and one party governments that you can live under where this doesn't happen at all, and some of them are at war or killing their own!