The Northern Territory government has attacked federal and state Labor ministers for saying “nothing” about the neglect and murder of Aboriginal children in Western Australia just months after they jointly rounded on the NT chief minister for requiring child protection workers to make “safety of the child” the top priority in all decisions. Anthony Albanese, while on a trip to New York recently, deflected questions on the child protection crisis in the Pilbara region north of Perth, saying he was “not about to intervene” on the issue, and putting the onus onto the West Australian government. In a response angering some Aboriginal leaders after weeks of shocking reports of Aboriginal children being left to fend for themselves in squalid conditions, Mr Albanese said: “This is a Western Australian issue”. Hours later, Minister for Women Katy Gallagher also described the scandal as a WA matter, even though the Albanese government is in a historic partnership agreement with all states, territories and Aboriginal peak bodies to share decisions and responsibility for child protection.
“I saw the Prime Minister’s response and the actual statutory child protection system is managed by the states and territories. The commonwealth does not have statutory child protection powers,” Senator Gallagher said. “We don’t run that system. It is appropriate that the WA government respond in that statutory sense.” Recently, at least seven tradesmen, arriving in a fleet of government-contracted cars, descended on the house at the epicentre of the state’s child welfare scandal in South Hedland’s Frisby Court to repair what residents describe as a “hellhole”. The media had revealed that up to 15 children, one just five years old, were sleeping on the floor on mounds of soiled clothing in the house strewn with rubbish, food refuse and dog excreta – without adult supervision for days at a time. With federal Indigenous Australians Minister Malarndirri McCarthy having made similar remarks in the Senate about the NT’s policies, the Country Liberal Party (CLP) government issued a sharp rebuke.
“In July, Tanya Plibersek and child protection ministers from every state and territory except the LNP government in Queensland condemned this government for putting the safety of Territory children first,” the NT government spokesperson said. “Those same ministers have said nothing while children in Western Australia are neglected and killed on a Labor government’s watch. For the Country Liberals, a child’s safety comes before everything. The Finocchiaro CLP government won’t apologise for that.” The Finocchiaro government’s rewrite of child protection laws in July caused a national outcry and prompted Social Services Minister Tanya Plibersek to issue a highly critical letter with state Labor child protection ministers and the Tasmanian Liberal child protection minister. Queensland did not sign the letter, which described the changes as detrimental to Indigenous children.
The NT law had previously directed child protection workers that “the best interest of the child is the paramount concern” whenever they made decisions and listed four things they must consider in no particular order including the child’s cultural background, identity, and connection to family and community. Three months after the disappearance and alleged murder of five-year-old Warlpiri girl Kumanjayi Little Baby, the Finocchiaro government relegated cultural background to a “secondary consideration” in the legislation. The amended law tells child protection workers their first priority when making decisions is “the need to ensure the physical safety of the child and to protect the child from harm and exploitation”. A spokesman for the federal government said: “The Albanese Labor government will always put the best interests of children first”. The debate over the commonwealth’s role in child protection escalated as Sue-Anne Hunter, the National Commissioner for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children and Young People, prepared to convene a roundtable on child protection in the Pilbara.
Hannah McGlade, a researcher, adviser to the Noongar Council for Family Safety and Wellbeing and member of the UN Permanent Forum for Indigenous Issues, was alarmed federal ministers were not acknowledging their role in child protection under the Closing the Gap agreement. “The commonwealth has committed to important national policy on child protection with the states so they cannot say this is a states-only matter,” Dr McGlade said. She said the commonwealth had a constitutional mandate and responsibility to involve itself in Aboriginal affairs, a direct request from the nation at the 1967 referendum. “It’s very concerning that they want to abdicate responsibility for Aboriginal children who are suffering in this country and even dying as a result of indifference from the state,” Dr McGlade said. The latest scandal began when the media revealed the WA department responsible for child protection had made a litany of errors before three siblings were murdered by their drug-addicted mother.
Source: Compiled by APN from media reports