http://www.news.com.au/national-news/welfare-tragic-for-indigenous-australians-says-aboriginal-leader-noel-pearson/story-fncynjr2-1226621171716
We often touch on this problem, the future of Australia,s Aboriginals,our first people.
I hope the link,the thoughts of Noel Pearson, does not get taken down too soon.
It is always refreshing to see him talk his words straight to the Heart of the issue.
We see, every time, the interference and damaging failure to understand, of do gooders who in fact do great harm in this area.
That sense, that an entitlement exists, is the wall keeping these people in shanty towns around this country.

I'm still waiting for John Howard to say he's sorry.

PS Did you know that John Howard is a climate change skeptic?

Getting a bit boring opinion!
We have spoken about this before, and not gained ground.
If the link is still active, and if we can leave our personal biases behind, it looks to be away forward.
Because, without fail, ANY attempt to change any aspect of social security is slammed by some, on both sides,this man is worth looking at.
His words could be the way out of poverty for our first people.
As a example of something we all, including the next generation of the ALP, post landslide, could use in a future new way for all welfare, for every one.
I see increasing not decreasing poverty, lack of education, and indeed the sense Aboriginals have the right to welfare , there! said it watch the do gooder,s strike at me.
But see too the damage such people do to the very folk they say they care for.

I have always thought that Noel Pearson spoke common sense and am saddened to learn of his ill health, he has my best wishes in recovering.

Education and home ownership to my mind is critical for the advancement of aboriginal communities.

I went to an AGM of the Council and CDEP program of an Aboriginal 'community', back in 2006, where the Chairpeson was congratulating the CDEP program, which had started the year before with 52 participants, (at a community with 12,000 acres of good land, almost drought-free), and had managed to retain all of those 52 on CDEP for another year. Not one person had been placed in employment - what an achievement ! A few months later, the Council successfully closed its brand-new dairy.

Over the next year, as the Howard Government scaled down CDEP programs, I suspect that all participants at this 'community' were paid out their LSL, back-pay, etc., etc., with a million-dollar bill set against the farm. Yes, LSL - long-service leave. After all, some had been on CDEP, sit-down money, for 'home duties', for twenty years.

In response, DEEWR, the underwriter of such debts, came in and took their million-dollars' worth of plant and equipment, including the new dairy. All gone. Utter dumb-@rse 'community'.

Meanwhile, in the cities, Indigenous people are seizing higher education opportunities as never before: there are now 60 % more degree-level students at uni than there were in 2005-2006. There are now around 33,000 (thirty three thousand) Indigenous tertiary graduates - overwhelmingly in the cities. If anybody is ingterested, I can send them a comprehensive database (joelane94@hotmail.com).

The 'Gap' is growing - i.e. the Gap between urban, work-oriented Indigenous people, and remote and rural, welfare-oriented Indigenous people. Lumping the entire Indigenous population together blurs these realities, and inevitably confounds solutions - not to mention, that by labelling the 'problems' as 'Indigenous' problems, rather than problems of remoteness, alienation, and lifestyle, may well be quite racist.

Christ, I wish there were a thousand Noel Pearsons and I too certainly wish him well. People like Noel give me hope for a genuine future for all Indigenous people, not just for the Harvard-bound elites.

Joe

Mr Opinion says, "I'm still waiting for John Howard to say he's sorry.

PS Did you know that John Howard is a climate change skeptic?"

That says it all doesn't it? Howard is smart, you & Rudd are are a long way from smart.