Page 3598 - Week 08 - Friday, 24 August 2012
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board, committee or council members are Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people; and the purpose and activity of the organisation relates specifically to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Thirdly, an Aboriginal organisation can be defined quite simply as one that an Aboriginal community acknowledges as an Aboriginal organisation. This definition is very important to Aborigines, because Aboriginal organisations have been central to the struggle for equal rights for nearly a hundred years. It is a description that is revered and respected. It also reflects the rights to self-determination and participation which are at the heart of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Self-determination means that Aborigines can choose how to live their lives, participate in decisions that affect their lives and have control over their lives.
Aboriginal organisations offer Aborigines a means for collective activity. This view is supported by the Australian Human Rights Commission guide to the UN declaration:
In recognising our group identities and decision-making rights, exercising self-determination means we can participate in Australian society.
The logic is inexorable: to be an Aboriginal organisation requires the agreement of your Aboriginal community. Aboriginal community support legitimises the organisation as Aboriginal and lends the authority for the organisation to speak and act on issues affecting the community.
It needs to be recognised that many organisations have adopted the nomenclature of Aboriginal or Indigenous and provide services to Aborigines; but it is only Aboriginal organisations which can provide a legitimate Aboriginal voice. It has been Aboriginal medical services, legal services and childcare services which have galvanised support for Aboriginal issues over the last 40 years precisely because of their legitimacy as Aboriginal organisations. The recognition of organisations as Aboriginal through Aboriginal community acknowledgement also mirrors the generally accepted definition of who is an Aborigine, which requires the recognition by their local Aboriginal community.
I have sought the opinion of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies and the ACT Indigenous Elected Body on this matter. Both supported my role as minister in making a decision about what is an Aboriginal organisation and furthermore agreed with the methodology described above. Furthermore, they both offered the opinion that organisations which choose to describe themselves as Aboriginal organisations should actively prove the claim.
Neither the Canberra Liberals nor Greens party members were able to understand the importance of my evidence in the estimates hearings about the lack of acknowledgement by Canberra’s Indigenous community for Billabong Aboriginal Development Corporation as an Aboriginal organisation. It shows their ignorance. It shows their lack of engagement with the portfolio. And it shows their lack of respect.
It was notable that no MLA from the Canberra Liberals or Greens party attended either the NAIDOC ACT awards event or the opening of NAIDOC on the
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