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Transcript of Australia's Hearing before the CERD Committee Transcript of the 1393rd, 1394th and 1395th Meetings held during the Fifty-Sixth Session of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination during its consideration of Australia's Tenth, Eleventh and Twelfth Periodic Reports and its continuing consideration of the matters considered by the Committee at its 54th and 55th Sessions in 1999. Disclaimer: This document has been compiled by the Foundation for Aboriginal and Islander Research Action (FAIRA) Aboriginal Corporation from tapes of the meetings of the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. FAIRA has endeavoured to provide a true and accurate record of the meetings. However there may be errors which remain undetected. FAIRA takes full responsibility for the accuracy of this report.
(Chairman) (Mr Aboul-Nasr) The second point, very briefly again, concerning the statistics that we heard. Mr Shahi referred to some of these statistics and to the fact that some of the land which was given to Aborigines was desert etc. I would like to add also to this, is that statistics can be deceiving sometimes. In cases of, for instance, in a situation in a certain country where the ownership of the land is limited to the natives by a million acres and then they come to us. The delegation come to us and say now they have two million acres, so that means that 100% raise in what they were given, and what they had some time ago. But I think we should really try to compare when we provide statistics, we try to compare what the indigenous population have today compared to what others have. That was not mentioned yesterday during the conversation, during the statistics that we heard. We heard that there was a raise in housing so much, there was a raising, it is good. I congratulate the Australian Government for this. But no doubt I would also prefer to have the comparison between what the Aborigines have in the field of education compared to other Australians. And, or health, etc. All these statistics should be, the comparison should be done on the basis of the different groups of the population. Not to what the Aborigines have today, and what they had a year ago. Maybe you can compare what they have today to what they used to have before they were so badly treated some time ago. Now, a point of, the last point which I would like to make is that I recognise with appreciation the statement of the head of the delegation of Australia yesterday, when he recognised the sins and the mistakes of the past. This was no doubt a good step forward, but can I really hope that it could be followed by other steps. Especially in light of the fact that as the Pope a few days ago gave us the example by apologising of the sins of the past, and the mistakes of the past. Could I aspire that maybe soon the Australian Government will be able to issue an apology for the sins of the past? I know that the Prime Minister of Australia made a statement to that effect, saying, no not now, or something very. I don't know if that is correct or not, but anyway, if it is not correct, could we hear it now? An apology, if it was not made? These are the three, minor (it might be a good start). These are the three remarks that I made, and I think that I did beat Mr Yutzis' record. Thank you sir. (Chairman) (Minister Ruddock) First, I said to the distinguished delegate from India yesterday, that I remembered many years ago meeting Mrs Gandhi, and she asked me how long I was going to be in India. And she said, well I said to her, nine days, and she said, well that's good. Most come for two and then think they can write a book. And I think there is a sense of that in what we are discussing here. I have lived a lot of these issues for many years. The indigenous people of Australia have lived them all their lives, and their forebears before them. And it is right to note that there has been a history, a shared history, as words we used. A shared history of, which the people of Australia today look at, and recognise, has aspects of it that could only be described as blemished. And there was a resolution. I was asked by your former distinguished Chair. I was interested in the question he put, it came up suddenly with some others, because he used the reference to the Pope's recent statement. And I was interested in the Pope's recent statement because it was seen as a form of apology. But some of those for whom the apology was offered said it still didn't go far enough. And almost every statement I have seen, Canada did much the same several years ago. The participants said, of the statement that was made, it had not gone far enough. And in a sense that is part of the live issue that we have in Australia. I'll read to you some elements from the parliamentary resolution moved by the Prime Minister, and seconded by the Leader of the Opposition, and passed unanimously by the Parliament, on the 26th of August 1999, it's the date, and it's in this form. 'That this House reaffirms its wholehearted commitment to the cause of reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians as an important national priority for all Australians.' And it makes a number of other points, which for timeliness I will pass over. It says in paragraph (e) 'it acknowledges that the mistreatment of many indigenous Australians over a significant period represents the most blemished chapter in our international history.' And (f) 'expresses its deep and sincere regret that indigenous Australians suffered injustices under the practices of past generations, and for the hurt and trauma that many indigenous people continue to feel as a consequence of those practices.' And says finally, 'and believes that we, having achieved so much as a nation, can now move forward together for the benefit of all Australians.' Now, that expression of deep and sincere regret was a genuine expression moved by the Prime Minister, and reflected his own personal apology, which he and many others in Australian life have given. And we do want to move forward together. But it is important to recognise something of that history, to recognise something of the dispersal, to recognise something of the contact that Aborigine people had with outside influences before European settlement in Australia 200 years ago. If you go to South America or North America, or if you're dealing with populations in parts of Africa, or the Scandinavian situations which were drawn to our attention, the contact between civilisations had been there for centuries, in many cases, before the sort of contact we've seen in Australia. And the situation is that Aborigines live in circumstances and culturally, and aspire to live culturally, differently to other Australians. And who am I to say that in those aspirations, they shouldn't have them? I'm not. If you believe in individual self-determination, and self-management, you want to respond positively to the way in which people believe that they, running their own lives, can move forward. Yet at times, in parts of the Northern Territory for instance - in the area that perhaps many of you may not be familiar with, a very small population, relatively isolated from the rest of Australia, in areas in which some indigenous people have lived traditionally for tens of thousands of years - but where often for good reasons, which people now question, Aborigines were disturbed. A lot of it had to do with the war, there was a fear of invasion. And people were gathered up and brought into settlements, often with people very well meaning, from the churches and institutions wanting to deliver services and programs, but programs which never really reached those communities, their hearts and minds. And later, when the view developed that we should respond to people's aspirations, we saw a change in the way in which we wanted to allow people to live and make their own choices, and to exercise those sorts of judgements, of personal self-determination. And there was the development of what was called 'the outstation movement'. And people moved away from those centres where very often services had been delivered. And they moved to points where they were able, in terms of their clan structures, if you can put it that way &emdash; I don't know how you describe the moieties under which Aboriginals live in a way that I can do simply to you, but they're very distinctive. And they have specific areas of land to which they relate traditionally &emdash; and that's what this land, native title land issue is all about &emdash; and it may for some be desert, and it may for others be areas of great lushness. The areas vary because the people lived in different parts of Australia, but the outstation movement took people back to their own land. And suddenly you had several hundreds of people expecting that you would be able to deliver services in remote and very outlying locations, which can only be reached by air, or road over many days, to provide health services, if somebody has to be evacuated to a hospital to have a baby. To be able to deliver educational services. To be able to build homes for people, and what sort of homes do you build for them? And to deliver communications, helped enormously by the advent of technology. I mean, I went to some Aboriginal outstations recently not so long ago. I saw a public telephone box sitting there with solar cells on the roof of the box and a satellite dish to provide communication linkages. But the cost of delivering services to people who make a choice and want to be dispersed are significant. And the capacity to be able to deal with infant mortality issues has been influenced by movement which was a response to people's desire to live traditionally and culturally. Now, Mr Banton asked some questions about housing. I mean I was fascinated with this view about where people might live in our cities. If you look at the United Kingdom, you'll go there and you will see these huge highrise buildings that were built 20 years ago as part of a slum clearance. We had the same phenomena in Australia. We had the same phenomena in relation to building on the outskirts of cities. Public housing. And you put a lot of money into it, I mean you don't build houses for nothing. And it becomes a part of your community infrastructure. And yes, people would have been housed in particular areas of Australia, and come together. And if they want to come together, would I want to stop them? And others might want to move, might want to disperse. And in fact, the dispersal is occurring in many communities. And in fact for public housing purposes we now have our authorities looking to find the greatest dispersal they can. I mean that is the new way in which these issues are managed today. But those public policies don't change overnight, they occur over time. And we are working in the same way as others do to address those issues. Now, what I wanted to do today was to, having dealt with those several questions, was to say look, there are many issues you have raised. We will respond as fully as we can, conscious that there is a concern, there can be too much paper, but I don't think we're alone in that. I think a lot of the paper you got was from our well-funded and well-resourced NGOs in Australia. And you can measure the resourcing by the level of interaction they have with you. We haven't deprived them of any of that. What we will be doing is, in point form, distributing not only the speeches that were made yesterday or those that we intended to make, but also to give you point by point answers in relation to each of the issues you've raised. And all that I would ask of you, is that with all that effort that we will put into preparing that information and getting it to you as soon as possible - and hopefully most of it today, certainly that from yesterday will be prepared &emdash; you've got all the questions as well, and answers, right? Is that you take it into account in your deliberations and in the preparation of your recommendations. We want to be in a position where we know that, having put that material before you, that it has been able to be used. Now, our distinguished Romanian delegate yesterday asked some questions… not delegate? Member? Expert from? Okay, our distinguished Romanian expert - my apologies - can I just say that there have been some very interesting developments in relation to growth in Aboriginal population. And between a census carried out in 1996 and one carried out in 1990, or thereabouts &emdash; six years, I think, was the period of difference &emdash; we saw a 33% increase. Now, that is not a reflection of an increase in natural births. It would be interesting if it was, and it may reflect in part an increase in natural births, I mean I'm not saying indigenous birth rates are not higher. But what it has reflected is, because we adopt the practice in Australia of essentially saying to be an Aboriginal you need to have some Aboriginal forebears, and it really doesn't matter how long ago. That you identify &emdash; I mean you say, 'I am proud to be an Aboriginal' &emdash; so it is self-identification. And then it is acceptance by Aboriginals generally, that you are an Aboriginal. But for the census we're dealing with self-identification. And I think the major explanation as to why the numbers have gone up is that many more people are today proud to identify themselves as Aboriginal. I think it is an issue of, I think Mr Banton took it up, in terms of moralisation (not de-moralisation). I think that people are much more proud of being indigenous, and identify as such, and I suspect in time that it will probably mean it will have an impact on the statistics. Because the sorts of people who are identifying now are those who were within the community, largely integrated, settled, and who have not necessarily had the same experience of marginalisation in quite the same way as those who have been identified as Aboriginals before this. So I think that it is important to recognise that. My friend from China raised the issue of, I suppose indirectly, the issue of xenophobia, and its reflection in political parties. Now historically, many years ago, Australia decided to go down the route of trying to ban political parties. And it might not surprise you to know that in the '50s, the party we decided to ban was the communist party. And we had a referendum. And the people of Australia said no, we don't want to ban a political party on the basis of their ideology, or their views. And they ought to be free to put them and the electorate free to dispense with them. And I'd have to say that in the context of Hansonism, which we found to be something very repugnant, quite contrary to the Australian ideal, it has been dealt with by the electorate. I mean, the lady who got into parliament by accident &emdash; I have to say that, she didn't have a platform, she didn't put a platform down when she stood &emdash; the platform that people focussed on was a speech that she made (and we can give you a copy of the speech, it was in the Parliament) it was a speech that she made after she was elected, when she was trying to give herself some rationale for being there. And when it came round next time, two and a half years later, she failed. The electorate didn't return her. Now in the meantime there had been some, I think, quirkish events that took place in Queensland and in New South Wales, where some people who were seen to be of this One Nation party were elected. But I suspect when the cycle comes around, they will face the same fate that she did. The party has in fact been de-registered, for political purposes, and that has some implications domestically. But it doesn't mean that she, or anybody else who wants to put those views can't stand. But what it does mean is that in the Australian political context those views have little credibility, and have not been supported by the community. Now, I want to talk to you a little about the way in which I understand your approach to these issues, and the impact of many of the issues we've addressed today in relation to Australia and the Australian federation. I think you've made it clear in your own comments that you sign up to the Convention, you accept the obligations, but that different countries, because of their institutional structures, their democratic processes, will respond in different ways. It doesn't make, because the responses are different, the implementation any less appropriate, but there will be different outcomes. Now, I think it's important because reference was made to federations. And it was to evidence an understanding that within the international community there are unitary states, but there are also federations. But there are also different types of federations. And Australia is a different type of federation because of our history. It's quite different from places like Canada and Germany, and if I went through and tried to make other comparisons, I'd probably be able to do so. But Australia is different, because we weren't a federation in which the state created, as we're seeing in Britain at the moment, some creatures of its own, as a state or territory or a regional body. In Australia, there were what would have been, by today's terms, separate countries. They were called New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria. They were all at the time colonies, separate colonies, of the United Kingdom. And in the de-colonialisation of Australia, which is something that took place at the time of federation, the states got their effective independence and agreed to federate to form a nation, Australia. But they didn't agree, I mean the political processes were not all that easy. Western Australia didn't know whether it even wanted to come on board. And there were compromises that were made. And what happened was, that when we federated, the states gave up some certain limited powers to the Commonwealth, but retained everything else for themselves. So when you talk about education being a state issue, it is substantially a state issue, except to the extent that the Commonwealth can influence it because we occasionally give them some money that we get by taxes. And I could take you through the law and justice issues. Most of them dealt with at a state level, the Commonwealth only dealing with criminal issues that arise within the context of certain federal statutes. It might be, you can commit essentially Commonwealth crimes, but they can only be in those areas where the Commonwealth has the competency to legislate, say in relation to immigration. And the constitution can't be changed easily. I mean, I was fascinated when the suggestion was made that we might implement a bill of rights. Now, in fact, we've largely followed the system of the United Kingdom. Mr Banton might be able to tell you more about it than I can. But we believe that institutions and conventions, and support by the public for certain values, can be very important. In fact, may even be more important than having a rule, that we can show you in writing, that nobody really takes seriously or obeys. And there are some other questions that arise from time to time. The United States has some elements in its constitution which they'd look back on now, in relation to, say, the right to bear arms. And which they'd say, well that was fine at a particular point in time in history, but now is it an appropriate freedom? Certainly in the Australian context, if we'd had it entrenched in our Constitution, we'd be saying how can we modify it? As we've sought to deal with the issue of access to firearms in our society. I mean the fact is that we have considered bills of rights, and we've rejected it. We do have a different culture, we think our culture works well. We have institutionally and within our society, a very, very strong commitment to dealing with human rights issues. And I think part of the reflection of my being here, and the nature of the delegation is, that we do, we're very proud of what we've been able to achieve over a long period of time. We are prepared to defend what we are doing because we believe it is appropriate to be transparent in relation to these issues. And so, in that context, I want to raise with you some delicate issues that you have put before us. One of them deals with mandatory sentencing. Now, the Committee is very much aware that in the Northern Territory and in Western Australia the law stipulates a mandatory minimum custodial offence for certain repeat offenders. Now, I think it's important to put that in context. I'm not offering it to defend it because my Prime Minister has said he personally does not favour mandatory sentencing provisions. So it's not a defence of mandatory sentencing that I offer. But it is to say that mandatory sentencing only occurs where there has been a breach of law, primarily in relation to property offences - in the case of Western Australia, home burglary &emdash; which were seen as very significant issues in those jurisdictions, so it only operates there. It requires a conviction for an offence. It also requires conviction under our law where the burden of proof is beyond reasonable doubt. It's not a low order burden of proof that operates in relation to these matters. And the fact is that under our criminal justice system, the responsibility for those questions rests with the states. Now, the Commonwealth has expressed its concern about the impact of these laws on young people in particular, and in relation to the impact on indigenous peoples. Now I think the impact can be quite variable, because convictions are required, I'd suspect that it's probably, in many cases, going to be more difficult for convictions to occur, because I think it's a natural reaction that those who are involved in the proceedings work harder to make sure that if a mandatory sentence is likely, that it is resisted, if there is any possible doubt. And one of the points that's been made to me is that while Aborigines are over-represented in our criminal justice statistics &emdash; and that is something that we have been concerned about, it's something that's been addressed by Royal Commissions, it's something in which we are putting a lot of work with the states to try to redress &emdash; but the fact is that mandatory sentencing is likely to produce an outcome where indigenous people, if the offences related to these matters, would be less represented in the statistics, rather than more represented. And it is certainly the case that it cannot be established that mandatory sentencing has significantly led to, or contributed to, over-representation in our criminal justice system. Now that doesn't justify it. I simply put it before you as material that has been in the public arena. We are a democracy, where these issues are discussed and debated, and debated very vigorously. The Commonwealth Attorney-General, my ministerial colleague, has written to his counterparts in both Western Australia and the Northern Territory, asking them to review their laws, particularly as they impact upon young people, as I was asked on a radio station because of reports of yesterday's questioning, that the fact is that those states have not yet responded, but by Friday of this week I guess it will be clearly on the agenda because there is a meeting to take place involving all of the Attorneys-General, and they will be in a position then to look at it. The Commonwealth is very conscious of looking for other ways through this issue, and we are seeking, from a committee of members of parliament, advice on further diversionary programs, and looking at the interpreter issue to see whether there are ways forward, progressively, to address these questions, which can help in alleviating some of the concerns about the mandatory sentencing question. Perhaps in that context I might say something about interpreter services, because a number of you have raised them. The first point I would make is that it is important to distinguish between interpreter services for day to day purposes, and interpreter services in the courts and in the criminal justice system. In other words, we do put a primacy on ensuring that where we are dealing with people's liberty, that people are properly serviced in being represented before appropriate courts and tribunals. But first let me say that what we are speaking of is a minority in a minority. Because a great majority of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people speak English as their first language. So there is no requirement for a universal service, either for people who have come to Australia as migrants, or for Aboriginal Australians. The services that we provide are essentially needs-based. And for all Australians what we endeavour to do is to provide access to translating and interpreter services, where they are required, with a premium on dealing with justice issues. Now the protection of course comes from the courts themselves. While there's no automatic scheme of translator or interpreter services for any group of Australians, the magistrate or judge can determine not to hear cases unless an adequate level of language service is available. But the one point I would make is: the most significant legal aid body in Australia which is separately resourced is that which offers assistance to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. In answer to one of the questions that was raised before, Aborigines have access to mainstream services, which are the services that have to meet the needs of every other Australian. But in addition, they have access to their own separately funded legal aid assistance, and the issue of adequacy of interpretation, I would assert, is not one in such a strong adversarial system would be allowed to go on without it being effectively addressed. And at the federal level, we've certainly ensured that all courts have interpreter policies to ensure that the principle of access and equity being implemented is that no person should be disadvantaged in proceedings before the court or in understanding the procedures or the conduct of court business because of a language barrier. Now I want to also take up one of the comments made yesterday from my Romanian expert friend who asked about the operation of state and territory legislation prohibiting racial discrimination. The fact is that all states and territories now have laws, in addition to the Commonwealth law. The Commonwealth legislation specifically provides that the state and territory legislation operate concurrently, and I can confirm that this means that people are able to make a complaint about racial discrimination as they choose, under either the state and territory legislation as it applies or under the Racial Discrimination Act. Now mention has been made today about the issue of reconciliation. The fact is that the Prime Minister and the government have been taking a lead on this issue. The Prime Minister is very much at the forefront. He and I attended, I think a fortnight ago, and there are representatives here who attended this same meeting, in which the Prime Minister again committed the government to work to a statement of reconciliation. I think to the delegate, I think it was the French representative who raised this question, there is of course a draft document of reconciliation which has been prepared by the Reconciliation Council, and it's had that document out for consultation, and at the moment it's going through a process of looking at whether or not it is likely to be a document which will be unifying, that is will bring Australians together. And it also has associated with it a number of national strategies, which in the language I might say of our distinguished rapporteur, is endeavouring to build upon effective benchmarking, monitoring, assessment of programs because it is something that we in Australia regard as very important and which I will come to in a moment. The Parliament has committed itself to the process of reconciliation and seeks, it's welcomed the draft, and it's encouraged participation, and all of us hope we can get a document. But just in case you've heard about the contemporary debate back in Australia, and I note you seem to get a lot of that here, the fact that we get a document, does that mean we're all going to be reconciled? Somebody has produced a document, do we put the issues aside and say look we're all together, we're reconciled? Now I suspect if I took that view and then came back to you and said look we got a document last year, we're reconciled, somebody would be asking me for measurable outcomes. I mean we realistically are saying we don't know that this document is going to bring that process to an end. We think it may have to be ongoing. And in fact the advice that we have been getting from the Council is that it may need to be an ongoing process. If we are going to influence the hearts and minds of people to be reconciled, I think the process is more important. To our distinguished expert from South Africa, I had the great privilege of being a Commonwealth monitor at your first democratic elections, and I followed most closely the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, led so ably by Archbishop Tutu. I noticed when its reports came down that there was a great deal of angst, I think is the word we would use, because it was a frank expression of view, and it criticised those who'd been in former governments and those who aspired to be in government and are now in government. And some said, well, you shouldn't have judged us as harshly. I can remember all of those public comments and debates. But when I was in South Africa at the beginning of last year, many of the people I spoke to said well, look, you really don't have to look at the document, the document itself, because that's not really the answer, what you have to look at is the process that we have been through. The fact that people have had an opportunity to talk about these issues, to come together, to make their personal apologies, to make admissions about their involvement in the apartheid regime, and in many cases to seek a form of forgiveness for that. And that process was seen as something that had had a very significant and unifying impact on the community. And I would say that in Australia regardless of whether we get a document or not, the process that we are going through is being, is very important in the context of our national identity, in which we want to address these issues in a very positive way. I'm not going to speak at length about the question that our expert from Pakistan wants more information on, I'll ask some of my experts to talk about the native title legislation, save to say that in some of the comments yesterday I heard the suggestion that disallowance of the Northern Territory legislation, their subordinate legislation by the Senate, might lead to a possibility that the state or the territory would be able to then go on and unilaterally act on some other basis. I want to make it very clear that until such time as there is approval of a state or territory scheme, there is nothing in place. You need to get that threshold subordinate legislation in place before the criteria as set out in the Native Title Act are met. Now I only want to make one other comment about the native title issue, and I suppose it's me as a politician talking. The Native Title Act is an enactment of our Parliament. The amendments to the Native Title Act are an enactment to our Parliament, enactment to our law by our Parliament. That is, it's been legislation passed by the House of Representatives and the Senate. There is a time in relation to legislation I think when you can actually delay its implementation. But the Commonwealth, I mean the government just can't suspend unilaterally legislation enacted by the Parliament. It has no power. And I'd have to say and I was being mischievous when I say it because I'm sometimes inclined to be this, I'm not sure that anybody in Australia would like the Parliament to be in a position, that is the Government, to simply unilaterally suspend the operation of an enactment. And I suspect my indigenous friends, if I said to them tomorrow, look we've had this request from an international body to suspend the operations of the native title legislation until such time as the Aboriginal population and the Australian Government presumably, or the rest of the Austra…, have an agreed position. Now I don't know how you get an agreed position, I don't know who speaks for whom, usually in the Australian context we get agreed positions through the Parliament. But if you suspended it, what would be the outcome. No grants. No hearings. No implementation. Suspension essentially connotes that you are going to put it on hold until you get some form of agreement. Now the uncertainty that we wanted to resolve was to sort out some issues in the way in which I outlined to you and to enable the legislation to proceed in certainty, where we could get grants of land, and I say that particularly to Mr Rodriguez, I think who raised that issue again today. Now there were some points made on data available in relation to migrant outcomes in Australia, we have a wealth of information that we can make available to you. I'm not sure from some of the other comments that I've heard that it's wanted, but I carry a great deal of objective information about settlement outcomes in Australia in my own personal office, and for those of you who ever pay me a visit you will find that it adorns a whole wall. There is a wealth of material that we can make available to you. We are, I think in terms of the provision of that information, we lead the world. I noticed that some of you were disappointed that in some of the material your nation states weren't mentioned, I think South Africa was one, Pakistan was another. Those statistics that were there were for the top ten contributors through migration based upon country of origin. Country of origin doesn't always give you race, I have to say that, it doesn't always explain ethnicity. We do try to get that sort of information, sometimes through surveys, sometimes through collection of data at various points. South Africa interestingly is a major source for migration today and it's a, something that we're obviously very happy to have, but I make the point again that our approach to migration is absolutely non-discriminatory. We do not believe that you can select people on the basis of their ethnicity, their country of origin, their race. The selection process is one which uses criteria unrelated to those factors. It does produce different outcomes, I have to say that, and the refugee and humanitarian program personifies it, but the approach is non-discriminatory. We do have a great deal of information about teaching in Australia. Primarily teaching in Australia is in English, but we do support programs for the maintenance of other languages. We do not seek to replicate every program and every school and every institution in the hundred and seventy-five different language groups that we have in Australia. But we do seek to encourage language maintenance. Our approach is to ensure, and I think we have the most comprehensive program in the world judged by experts, for teaching English to new arrivals, where every arrival is entitled to at least 510 hours tuition, with some flexibility to try and manage more tuition for those people who aren't able to obtain benefits immediately. Now I was particularly interested in the rapporteur's emphasis on migrant women and the role of women, and I wanted to make some brief comments about that, because it's a large and complex issue which I couldn't do justice to in the time, but it would not surprise you I am sure to know that there are different views in different segments in our multicultural society about the role of women. And even in our indigenous communities, women have very special rights, and for some purposes are segregated culturally, and cultural and traditional reasons for difference can be very challenging issues if you have a view about equality of the sexes, and we do try to deal with these issues up front. We try to empower women, and if you knew some of the women around me, by blood and other, you would know that empowerment of women is a very significant issue, particularly those who are young and professional and look for the fulfilment of their own opportunities. I only want to deal with one other matter, I think I've picked up the mandatory sentencing, the public housing, the some of the questions.. there are a couple, look if I can go to Mr Nobel. I'll put my glasses on to see if he's looking at me. Mr Nobel, I appreciated your intervention. Yes, I am worried about the conventions. And I have to tell you my comments reflected those of many leaders in Europe, I mightn't say the Swedes but necessarily I have to say many leaders in Europe to whom I have talked, and when I meet with Mrs Robinson today, later today, one of the issues I will raise with her is the interlinking of the various treaties and the way in which they can be at times used for purposes that they were not originally intended. Now I am sure the Refugee Convention was never intended to be a charter for immigration. But the fact is that today the Refugee Convention is being used in many circumstances by people who are seeking migration outcomes. And it is a question of how you address those issues, do you address them up front or not? Look I met the Secretary General of Amnesty just two days ago. I don't talk about these issues behind people's backs, I talk about them up front. I said to Amnesty if you believe in this Convention and the way in which it works, you're going to have to think outside the square and to find ways in which it can fulfil its purpose legitimately and that the abuse can be effectively addressed. Otherwise, to use a colloquialism, we will throw the baby out with the bath water. Now I don't want to see that. I've taken an interest in human rights issues over a long period of time. But if we don't address those questions that is what will happen. Now why did we take, in relation to the Somali, the position we did? The answer is very simple. When people come as asylum seekers, I don't know whether they are genuinely an asylum seeker or not. I don't know. That is a matter that has to be determined, and it's not determined by me. It's determined through a proper process, a creditable process. But if you allow identification by newspapers and television programs or outside bodies or well-meaning NGOs, of people who may be a refugee, who may have left family behind, and if the argument is that people have been, are to be persecuted in their home country, and that family members can be targeted because they are there, why do you put people at risk? Why do you do it? I think if your concern is for the individual you would want to ensure confidentiality and privacy in relation to those matters and that's simply what we sought to do. Mandatory detention was raised, and I guess it will become an issue elsewhere. Detention of people who arrive unlawfully in Australia occurs not because they are asylum seekers. About, I think the figure I saw recently, about 90% or more of asylum seekers in Australia are free in the Australian community. The question of detaining people when they arrive is one in which we need to ensure that we're able to address effectively health issues, identification issues, issues relating to the claims that people make, and that people are available to ensure that those questions can be properly addressed. And the experience elsewhere has been that if you don't have people available, very often they're not there at all when you need to talk to them. And if the end result is that you have not got a bona fide asylum seeker you need to be in a position to remove them. And strange as it may seem, a lot of people who make claims, who are seeking immigration outcomes, don't readily present for removal when that is the outcome. And so in the Australian context we have had a system of detention in place. People are released when, and I hope as soon as possible, when they have a lawful entitlement to be entered into Australia, or they are released at any time if they wish to go. At any time. I would welcome some advice from you, I might say, Mr Nobel and perhaps other members of the delegation, about when special benefits can in fact become separate development. In Australia there was a great deal of abhorrence of apartheid, and the issue of how you address significant disadvantage without institutionalising ultimately a form of separate development, is something that in a lot of what we are doing we are conscious of. It's one of the reasons that I was interested in Mr Banton's reference to self-management and self-determination being one and the same. (Mr Banton) (Minister) (Chairman) (Mr Banton) (Chairman) (Ms McDougall) Now this point about federalism, I was very interested in your comments. As you know I come from a country that has a federal system that was very much like Australia in the making. It started with independent colonies that decided to join a federation and only gave such powers to the Federal Government as those states chose. You know the question of states' rights really has been quite a perpetual issue in our country. It's one that you know we fought a civil war over. We fought a very bloody civil war in our country over whether states had the right to, and were free to, practice the abhorrent practice of slavery. And as an outcome of that… (Minister) (Ms. McDougall) (Minister) (Ms. McDougall) Only the … (Chairman)
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