A “call to action” has been announced in protest at the forced closure of remote Aboriginal communities.

Protests are due to take place on 26, 27 and 28 June, the first weekend of the midyear holidays. They are the latest in a series of actions against the proposed closures. On 19 March, an estimated 25,000 people around the country gathered in protest. A second round of protests occurred on 1 May, with people participating in 97 rallies in Australia and overseas. A social media campaign, run by SOS Blak Australia, has been used as a platform to campaign against these closures.

Background

In 2014, the federal government decided that it would no longer take responsibility for the provision of municipal services to remote Aboriginal communities, arguing that states and local communities should shoulder this responsibility. The state most affected is Western Australia, where there are 274 remote communities, 90 per cent of which are in the Kimberley and Pilbara. The Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) lands in South Australia are also affected. Some of these communities are very small, and the cost of maintaining them is upwards of $1 billion per year. This includes the provision of essential services, such as power, water and rubbish removal; services which have been provided by federal government for more than 50 years. Prime Minister Tony Abbott was widely reported as stating: “What we can’t do is endlessly subsidise lifestyle choices”. Upon assigning responsibility to the state government, the federal government offered WA $90 million over two years. As a result of the funding shortfall, in November 2014 the WA government announced that nearly 150 of the state’s remote Aboriginal communities would close. If these communities do close, more than 10,000 people will be removed from remote communities and placed into larger regional towns. Since then, there has been some backtracking and promises of consultation, but uncertainty remains about the future of these communities.

Why it matters

Many of these communities were established in the 1970s as part of a movement to allow Aboriginal people to return to country. The threatened closure of these communities has caused enormous stress and anxiety for those living in these communities. The threatened closures don’t take into account that many of these communities exist in places that enable Aboriginal people to stay in touch with their land and their culture. It has been described as another example of forced removal and dispossession. The Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress described it as: “an indefensible attack on the human rights of Aboriginal people”. There has also been little consideration given to the impact the forced closures will have on the communities people are moved to, and whether adequate housing, education and health facilities exist to ensure a smooth transition.

Union response

This issue was considered by the Federal Executive of the Australian Education Union in April. As the QTU is the Queensland branch of the AEU, several QTU Senior Officers were at this meeting, where it was resolved to “unequivocally condemn any actions by the Barnett and Abbott governments to close Aboriginal communities and forcibly remove Aboriginal peoples from their lands in Western Australia”. As more information becomes available, we will share it on the QTU website.