Ringy & Gossy are the new cheerleaders of crude self-determination theory in Indigenous affairs.

They are so busy relentlessly showing us how "liberal" and "progressive" they are, and being nice and supportive to Aboriginal people en masse - declining to see or hear or speak about the glaringly obvious problems presented by the behaviour of a great many Aboriginal men and some women in the remote communities and town camps - they fail to connect the dots.

The bodies of the premature dead are piling up in the morgues, Ringy.

The prisons & hospitals & dialysis centres are choc-a-block with black inmates & patients dying well before their time Bob.

Aboriginal women & kids far too often can't sleep at night, even at wonderful self-determining laugh-a-minute Yuendumu.

Far far too many Aboriginal kids don't have anybody at home concerned to get their pussy ears and skin sores and rotting teeth attended to before they turn into systemic lifelong problems for them.

The kids often can't concentrate and learn, if they are lucky enough to actually get to their local primary school.

Even the police, whom Ringy & Gossy sometimes grudgingly acknowledge are needed, can't get a decent night's sleep, and so are edgy and bitter when forced to perform their thankless tasks.

Is it a central problem that Ringy & Gossy are so emotionally traumatised by these unspoken dilemmas that they become excessively guilt ridden and cannot bring themselves to speak the words "endemic child neglect"?

Bob,
I do not mind discussing issues, but it gets a bit tiresome to be immediately labeled as anti- aboriginal, by some, if they dissagree with ones viewpoint. But that goes also with being called racist if I happen to oppose high immigration. But I can live with that and take it that these people cannot argue my point of view. I note you did not express this.

Ignorant I may be, but my information comes from the 'Little Children are Sacred' report and conversing and reading what teachers,nurses and other medical people state to be the situation.

We may have to agree to dissagree because I will stick to my view that the welfare of the kids and women must over ride all else and all the other states should follow. Domestic violence and child abuse is far too high and I would not mind at all if qarantining of welfare was introduced to ALL families in Aus.

It is reasonable to expect conditions if welfare payments are received. Arrange one own income if one doesn't like the conditions. If that cannot be done where one presently lives, then one had better move to where it can be done. Thousands do this every year. Someone said here on OLO, a while back, that 60000 aboriginals had received higher education in the past X years. That is good and they did not get that by siting arround at home. These made hugh effort to help themselves.

I do not see qurantining of welfare as a penalty on good families as responsible parents would spend more on the allowable items anyway.

My suggestion for aboriginal improvements has ben to take note of what has happened in the well functioning communities (there are some apparently)and try to implement the same procedures elsewhere.

Am told Utopia is one such and Windale,near Newcastle NSW, was one of the worst for child abuse and is now one of the best. Surely we can learn from their efforts.

TBC

The sole reason for the intervention in the NT was to reduce the physical and sexual abuse of children and improve their well being.

The questions I would be asking of a review team is :-

Has the abuse of the kids been reduced?

Has the health of the kids improved?

Are there more kids attending school?

Is there less domestic violence?

Has quarantining welfare payments resulted in the kids being better looked after by their parents?

Or did the review team not give answers to these questions?

In the absense of a great hue-and-cry about the intervention not working, I assume the answers to my questios is YES.
Then why not carry on for, at least, another 12 months and review agaain.

I notice one has said that Dan Fitzpatrick's assasment is wrong or queried what that medical bloke said in his post.

To this point in time the only answer that the WA Government has had is to give 12 year old girls contraceptives to stop them falling pregnant in some communities. As reported in todays West no doubt the older men exploiting these children in the name of culture will be pleased with this outcome. Well I suppose Governments will be able to boast about reducing pregnancies. Those that oppose intervention are either not that interested in saving these kids or are deliberately ignorant of what goes on in these communities. It would not be tolerated in the white community. last week in court in the Kimberelys one couple had 90 charges of abuse against children. Where are the activist? Sitting in offices talking about the evils of 20o years ago! Wake up Australia. Hopefully Ms Macklin will have the fortitude that Mr Brough had shown.

The Wild/Anderson report <http://www.nt.gov.au/dcm/inquirysaac/pdf/bipacsa_final_report.pdf>
should be a mandatory read for anyone wanting to become informed about the "Little Children Are Sacred" Inquiry recommendations and definitely before pontificating about the Intervention and it's aftermath. There were 97 recommendations but the Howard/Brough trigger was to act on one and ignore the rest.

Their reasons for implementing the Intervention were purely political and ignoring the other recommendations is pretty much what Governments do when reports from Inquiries are handed down as anyone who has participated in an Inquiry will know.

So it was with Jenny Macklin's response to Peter Yu's Report

Aboriginal Communities alone can resolve their problems. They must establish their own agendas for consultation with Jenny Macklin and the Rudd Government and put them on notice for a timetable to execute their agenda. This can only be achieved by resolute, united action through Community to Community consultation.

It is time for the Land Councils to show leadership and assist in developing a strategy for a plan of Action

Noel Pearson summed it up for most Australians when he said:

"I'm amazed that anybody would put the protection of children secondary to anything, particularly when those children are subject to imminent abuse, abuse that takes place on a regular basis that's the subject of binge drinking, week in, week out. .....(But) if you're willing the whole exercise to fail, what kind of priorities do you have in relation to the wellbeing of Indigenous children?" and

"It will depend on Indigenous people at the end of the day asking themselves and answering the question, asking themselves whether they believe the integrity and wellbeing of their children is the number one priority in the world, and if it is, if it is, let's understand that everything happens within a political context. Of course this is a political context. Of course we don't like that person and we don't, we don't like that party and we don't - we suspect that person's motives and so on, but geez, the imperative here is the protection of our children and we as Indigenous people have got to ask ourselves the hard question - do we put the protection of our children ahead of everything else?"