The Director of Youth Affairs Network of Queensland, Siyavash Doostkhah today slammed the Howard emergency plan for Aboriginal communities, saying "this is a repeat of the children overboard saga which helped Howard to retain power in the last election".

"If the Government was serious about addressing disadvantage, then it would, among other actions, be negotiating a Treaty with the First Australians. A Treaty would be the only genuine way that the Australian Government could show it is committed to treating Indigenous Australians fairly and as equal citizens."

"Any response to Indigenous disadvantage must also take Aboriginal languages seriously. Many of the health problems in remote indigenous communities are exacerbated by the fact that English is the 2nd, 3rd, 4th or in some cases 5th or 6th language of Indigenous Australians. Any long-term plan therefor must recognise this and include strategies for teaching white professionals Indigenous languages, rather than doing what we've always done - that is, force Indigenous people to learn English from people who can't even say hello in the local language."

"However, the Government is relying on the tried, tested and failed command and control strategies of the past. Howard is hoping that Australian's won't see this ploy so he can divide and conquer those committed to social justice for Indigenous Australians. This, coupled with the softly softly Labor approach of just aiming for the lodge, is taking this country back decades."

"While we have no Treaty with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, this country is under occupation, just like Iraq."

Mr Doostkhah also pointed out that "in many provincial areas Aboriginal parents have no alternative but to send their children to religious based boarding schools, which are not in tune with the needs of Aboriginal children and succeed in pushing them further to the fringe of society. The education system is still Anglo centric. It does not recognise Indigenous laws or language and it isolates the needs of Aboriginal young people," he said.

"A Treaty, and recognising Indigenous language must be part of any plan to address educational disadvantage" he said.

"But instead what we get from this Government is to 'send in the troopers'. This shows startling levels of ignorance. Howard's whitewash view of history ignores the complex ramifications that have arisen from the fact that this country was invaded and terrible acts of injustice were performed against Aborigines; the land was stolen, people were massacred, women and children were raped, European diseases and alcoholism were released upon the population and their children were taken - to name a few."

Mr Doostkhah believes views like the ones expressed by Noel Pearson have paved the way for the Government takeover. "Advocating that young indigenous people should be sent to urban private schools, that welfare is the cause of problems and that Indigenous people need to adopt capitalist structures and privatise their communal land has allowed Governments to wipe their hands of the problem and instead blame the victim. Under Pearson's model, the only responsibility Governments have is to lay down the law when the cost of not providing decent education, health and employment services gets too high in the form of community breakdown. And now that the cost has got too high - or the electoral benefit high enough - we continue to ride roughshod over Indigenous Australians by sending in the troopers. We've tried it before, it doesn't work."

Mr Doostkhah concluded by saying "Only by treating Indigenous people as equals will any long-term changes be possible. This needs to start with a Treaty, taking Indigenous languages seriously and ensuring that the basic services enjoyed by Australians elsewhere in the country are available to remote communities."

CONTACT: Siyavash Doostkhah, Director, Youth Affairs Network of Queensland (YANQ)
Phone (07) 3844 7713 or 0407 655 785