Congress (UAICC) is the UCA Aboriginal and Islander Christians from all over Australia who have come together to form a National Congress, the result of a vision developed through a series of gatherings in the early 1980’s. Here is their response to the WA closures of communities and ways to stand in solidarity with our indigenous friends. (Image is from our destiny together at Parliament)
Threat To Close Communities In Western Australia
In 2014 the Federal Government decided that it would no longer accept responsibility for the provision of municipal services to remote Aboriginal communities including, in Tasmania and Victoria, the provision of remote housing. The argument was that such services should be the responsibility of states and local communities.
The reality is money. In Western Australia these services cost approximately $1 billion annually, but the WA Government was offered an extra $90 million over two years. Not surprisingly the WA Government has decided to close communities – nearly 150 of them. It made the announcement in November 2014, then seemed to backtrack with a promise of funding, but has again recently reiterated its threat to close communities.
This has caused enormous stress and anxiety across these communities. In a nutshell the issues are:
• there has been no consultation with Aboriginal people or the organisations which represent them;
• many of these communities exist in places that allow Aboriginal people to stay in touch with their land and their culture. This is another example of forced removal and dispossession (see below). There has been no attempt by government to understand what such forced community closures and movement of people means for people’s social, mental, spiritual and physical life; and
• the movement of this many people will put enormous pressure on the communities they go to – housing, education, health facilities, and community relationships. Nothing has been done to plan for and deal with such impacts.While these are decisions of the WA Government, they arise from decisions of the Federal Government and its attempt to shift the financial responsibility. It is an indefensible attack on the human rights of Aboriginal people…..
Continue reading here: http://uaicc.org.au/threat-to-close-communities-in-western-australia/
Statement on the Forced Closure of Indigenous Communities from UCA Assembly on Vimeo.
Statement from Congress youth committee.
