Page 581 - Week 04 - Thursday, 29 June 1989
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
groups and some, but certainly not all, groups deriving from, for example, the Indo-Chinese community.
The problem here is not necessarily individual disaster, although that occurs; it is disaster related to the larger culture of disadvantage and the culture of poverty. Here this is a considerable problem. This has to be dealt with not case by case but, in a way, in a larger arena, in an arena of care for these disadvantaged groups. The whole society needs to be involved with that.
I refer, for example, to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act, principle 6, which states:
The child, for the full and harmonious development of his personality, needs love and understanding.
We all need that -
He shall, wherever possible -
and for "he" read "he or she" -
grow up in the care and under the responsibility of his parents, and, in any case -
and this is what I am getting to -
in an atmosphere of affection and of moral and material security...
That moral and material security is a societal responsibility, not merely a parental responsibility. I hope here in the ACT we will be very concerned indeed about that area.
MR WHALAN (Minister for Industry, Employment and Education) (4.07): Very briefly, Mr Speaker, the interest shown in this Assembly on this matter, I think, reflects two comments which are recorded in relation to the reaction of elements of the Commonwealth Parliament to the Burdekin report. I note that the Prime Minister is quoted as having said, upon reading the report, that youth homelessness is "a tragedy that transcends politics and parties in government", and the Leader of the Opposition has been quoted as saying, "I don't think that in the time that I have been in politics I have been as impressed by a report in the way this one has. Politics by and large ought to be put aside".
That seems to be increasingly the community view. The Burdekin report is really the most authoritative examination of this issue that has ever taken place, and one cannot ignore the evidence which came forward and the recommendations which the report contained.
It is pretty staggering when you look nationally at the sorts of figures and see the trend. The report indicates
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .