Senate Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee, , 4:00:01 to 4:05:36
Minister McCarthy reaffirms the government's commitment to the principles of the Uluru Statement from the Heart following the Voice referendum, while the NIAA tables its annual report for parliamentary review.
Topics: First Nations, Government spending
Speakers: Speaker 22, Senator Kerrynne Liddle, Julie-Ann Guivarra, Senator Karen Grogan, Speaker 20, Hon Malarndirri McCarthy
>> Minister, three years on from the failure of the voice referendum, does your government remain committed to treaty and truth?
>> I have always maintained the principles of the Uluru statement from the heart are still with us.
>> Okay. Um, Minister, it's very disappointing that the NIAA annual report was actually tabled uh for a review by parliamentarians on Friday afternoon last week. Doesn't leave a bit of time for people to do analysis, but anyway, here we are. NIAA, when did you provide that to the minister?
>> Senator Rachel Jackson, Chief Operating Officer, the uh annual report was provided to the minister on the 15th of October.
Can I just
>> just in time for Senate estimates?
>> I um my error I I did not give Miss Gavvara a chance for an opening statement. My sincere apologies. Would you care to make an opening statement?
>> Um thank you Senator and chair. Um not not a formal statement. I did uh want to acknowledge in fact that our uh annual report had been tabled. Um the second issue was just to introduce um Josh Smith who is our new deputy CEO of policies [clears throat] and pro programs not so new now has been with us for a few months but um yes has taken over the policy and program role that um I was previously in. So that that was it. Thank you.
>> Okay.
>> My apolog for interrupting your line of
>> That's okay. Thank you. So continuing on the theme that we often hear in this place which is we're listening to uh people out there in communities. One thing I did notice was that the level of complaints about NIAA in 2024 25 was 192 and in 2526 that's 275. That's a 43% increase in complaints [clears throat] to NIAA one would assume people's service, people's um engagement with NWA. Can you
Um, Senator, I I'll hand across to uh Sean Worth, who's in charge of our integrity team soon, but um the one thing I would say in regards to um our our formal complaints mechanism is we do in fact have a formal complaints mechanism. Um and we certainly encourage both community and providers to um submit uh complaints to that. So uh in terms of uh you know seeing a number of of complaints increase um we wouldn't necessarily uh see that as a as a bad thing. It's important that we actually provide the opportunity as I said for both providers and for community to come forward with issues um that they feel need to be addressed. Um we've done similar work recently too with um our indigenous advancement strategy which of course is our main funding. Um you'll be aware that we've recently uh opened up a survey for all providers and all community in fact to come forward with um ways in [clears throat] which they could see us improving the indigenous advancement strategy. But I'll just turn to um u Mr. Worth to see if he has anything further to add just in relation to the numbers.
>> Thank you.
>> I've got the numbers. I'm actually we're really pressed for time so I'm going to go straight to it. What is the nature of the complaints because people are clearly unhappy if you've got an increase in 43%.
>> Thank you, Senator. Sean Worth, group manager, integrity ina. Um, Senator, we we receive complaints across a whole range of different uh matters. Um, approximately a third of the complaints that we receive are actually not complaints for the NIAA themselves. So, whilst they're included within that total because those are the total received, they're not in relation to the operations of the NIAA. And so they are referred to other agencies where where
relevantly this is a 43% increase to the the body that is known to to manage indigenous Australians about >> what is happening for people in indigenous affairs right across the
>> Yes.
>> Right. Okay. Thank you.
>> Yeah. So approximately 50% of the complaints that we do receive do relate to some element of the service that we might be funding uh provider related complaints and so those are uh are then referred within the agency to the appropriate uh regional areas so that they can work through the nature of those. Uh and then the other complaint categories are spread across a number of uh different areas of of First Nations interest um native title um uh concerns that that people might have regarding their own uh claims and and how long it's taking to to go through whatever process it is uh and a number of others. So um Senator there has been an increase in the number um we have been investing a lot of effort within the agency to ensure that we can uh receive and respond to those complaints as appropriate. Um I think it's it is uh something that we have been investing in uh in [clears throat] order to increase the trust uh for those people who do make complaints they have a level of confidence that these complaints will actually be dealt with. Um I think uh I think it would naturally be concerning uh if we if we didn't deal with complaints um people would give up on the process. So I I think uh