Michael Long, AFL star and aborigine is planning a walk from Melbouren to Canberra to talk to John Howard.

Could I suggest an alternative. Fly to Darwin, catch a bus to the Border Store on the border of NT and Arnhem Land and then walk to Oenpilli.

Tell the people there to stop trashing their houses and start sending their kids to school.

Everyday.

Fridays Australian carried an article Third World housing shames nation. The author, Ashleigh Wilson may be shamed but I’m not.

I’m angry.

Every society has people who live in squallor. It generally comes about due to a lack of education, heredity issues and some substance abuse. You can’t always blame the government, (even if it is a conservative one) as no matter how much help you give some people they will maintain their position at the bottom.

There are pockets of similar disfunctional living in white societies and I don’t feel ashamed about them either.

Just happens.

What is needed is an attitude change with these people and that stems from education. We also need an attitude change in the media and amongst sports and academic elite where people like Ashleigh and Michael Long are long on ‘Poor fellow me’ and short on solutions.

Ashleigh – try doing a piece titled Solutions to an old problem

Michael – Your’e a hero to a lot of aborigine youth. Why not try and help them get on track through sport. Sponsor a team maybe. Every time you talk to them tell them about the gift of education and the long death that substance abuse offers.

According to a Northern Territory government research paper to be presented to a housing ministers meeting in Adelaide on December 3, it would cost about $2 billion nationally to meet Aboriginal housing demand, including $850 million in the Northern Territry. The paper said the areas of greatest need were in the Northern Territory, Queensland and Western Australia.

The long suffering tax payer may be getting sick and tired of replacing houses but sure, give ’em some more. While we are handing over more money maybe we could talk to organizations like the Northern Land Council and ask them what are they are doing with royalties. We know they buy 100 series Toyotas, helicopters and mansions for the leaders but what about the poor ‘poison cousins’?

We know that for years each family on Groote Island received a suitcase containing $35,000 cash twice a year from the Royalty bonanza.

Just a thought…maybe some of that could have been used for house maintenance. You know, when the hot water service breaks down, repair it. When some cousin mixes metho and a ciggie and burns down the back porch, replace it.

No. Too hard. Let’s just make the Darwin Toyota dealer a millionaire.

ABORIGINAL welfare is to be rebuilt from the ground up with the introduction of behavioral “contracts” with black communities in return for healthcare, education, dole money and services, in an attempt to turn around 40 years of failure.

Indigenous Affairs Minister Amanda Vanstone said the payment of “sit-down money” would end.

The Government proposals include

….the “no school, no pool” system to reward school attendance by stopping children from visiting the community swimming pool if they do not attend classes.

The rewards system includes a DVD player for the community to run movie nights for children who attend school, and a pool of bikes to be ridden by children in the afternoons after they have attended school

Predictably Aboriginal leader Pat Dodson angrily condemns the plan thus headlining one of the major problems Australia has with fixing the indigenous problems.

“This is not mutual obligation — nothing like it,” he said. “It’s fascism gone mad. It’s crazy stuff. Two hundred years of enlightenment and this is the best they’ve been able to deliver.

Any plan that even hints of paternalism is labeled fascism. You?re no help Pat. Always critical but never, ever suggesting an alternative plan for debate.

I don’t know all the answers but I do know a plan, an idea, always beats just more of the same.

Community members can scream fascism all they want but that only amounts to doing nothing and obviously something has to be done.

Pat goes on to say

… the plan had all the hallmarks of a government short on ideas. Having rejected the big picture — constitutional change, a treaty, land rights and reconciliation — and having questioned the validity of the stolen generations and minimalised native title, the Howard Government now planned to use welfare payments as a weapon for change.

Dead right, Pat. Constitutional change, treaties, land rights and reconciliation, stolen generations and native title are not answers to real life problems. Cool over coffee in Military Road, Cremorne but meaningless in remote communities.

Sober up and get your kids off to school is a good first step to racial pride and a long way ahead of whatever constitutional change your looking for.

We have tried grog bans but life isn’t that simple. As I commented in a previous blog, while the locals have the cash they will buy grog. If the town is dry, they will consume it on the outskirts.

ATSIC regional commissioner Michael White, who was invited on to the Government’s new indigenous advisory council, questioned why Aboriginal people should be the “only ones forced to do this.”

“It sounds like blackmail to say that if you’re not a good enough mum or dad, you won’t receive any payments and won’t be able to feed your kids.”

You may have a point Michael, but making it doesn’t help your people. Plenty of white families have similar problems but that isn’t your worry. You either accept the plan man, or come up with a better one. You’re there to help the blacks, not to cry – ‘but they do it, why can’t we?’

Smart-card push to ensure payments not wasted headlines another suggested solution. Dole money to be accessed through smart cards that have implanted father chips saying no, you cannot buy grog – try buying food, school clothes for your kids or pay your electricity bill.

While accepting Aboriginal communities did have problems with children’s school attendance rates and alcohol abuse, Mr Yeatman and fellow councilors at Yarrabah, south of Cairns, felt the proposed welfare reforms would do little to get people working.

Councilor Josephine Murgha said the reforms were yet another example of the Howard Government pushing policies on Aboriginal communities without consulting them.

Wrong, The moves were first laid on the table by Aboriginal leaders

Since Mr Quartermaine raised their potential benefit for child protection, Tasmanian ATSIC commissioner Rodney Dillon, Australia’s first indigenous woman MP Carol Martin, child health expert and former Australian of the Year Fiona Stanley, and Cape York lawyer Noel Pearson have backed smart cards as an option worth exploring.

She goes on to say

“We would rather sit down with Yarrabah people and develop strategies and ways to deal with kids who are not attending school,”

Councilor Murgha, the problem has existed for a long time now. ATSIC have had the chair and the chance for years and haven’t improved on the situation.

Bad plan too date, let’s try another one.