Senate Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee, , 3:57:54 to 4:00:01
The Minister discusses the government's focus on the National Agreement on Closing the Gap as the primary policy framework following the Voice referendum.
Topics: First Nations, Closing the Gap
Speakers: Hon Malarndirri McCarthy, Senator Kerrynne Liddle, Unknown Speaker
>> Thank you. Thank you. Uh thank you. Um I start with a question about um prominent voice campaigners and indigenous leaders uh Thomas Mayo, Pat Anderson, Travis Love have all criticized the government's lack of policy direction in indigenous affairs. On the third anniversary of The Voice, Ken Wyatt said, "What statements have [clears throat] you seen from the Minister for Indigenous Australians that are proactive since the Voice? from what has come from the prime minister. He was very active during the voice since the voice there's been very little. I asked does the Albanese government have a single overarching policy for indigenous Australians portfolio and if so what is
>> Uh thank you Senator Little for the question. Uh we are working on closing the gap the national agreement and the coordination of that across the country. One of the things that I said quite often throughout uh the voice campaign was what will you do if people vote no? I said well it means that people want the status quo here in the parliament we have as part of that the national agreement on closing the gap. So what I've been doing is picking up the strength of that to try and look at all those targets and see what we can do in terms of ensuring the parliaments across the country commit to their commitment to that agreement. People may not like that but that's what we're doing.
>> So close the gap is not a policy it's an objective. Is that right?
It's certainly our objective but it is a policy as far as uh the agencies and departments are concerned. Uh we have a working group a ministerial working group on closing the gap in terms of working directly uh with the ministers of each of the state and territory governments and that is a clear direction that we are going and that is the one that we are focused on. It doesn't mean we can't focus on other matters. We certainly are doing that as well, but this is our clear focus at the