It’s time for the government to listen
If the Australian government keeps treating Indigenous people like children, the sense of division between our nation’s First People and our second will only increase.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Our new Prime Minister Scott Morrison, despite promising not to be a culture warrior, has spent much of his time fighting culture wars - when not fighting strawberry needlers. One such battle, which has seen him don the armour and sharpen the spear, concerns the date of Australia Day.
His motives for bringing this painful and divisive debate up again are transparent enough. This is a man who defeated the right wing’s choice for PM, Peter Dutton, and is now trying to patch things over with the conservatives who ousted Turnbull and ensure the security of his tenure.
He blamed inner-city hipsters, the left, the Greens and Labor as the instigators for changing the date. This ignored the long history of Indigenous people who have protested and continue to raise their voice against the day of January 26 being a day of celebration.
Here is the crux of the problems existing between Indigenous people and the Australian government. Morrison seemingly refuses to acknowledge that Indigenous people have their own thoughts and opinions of their own; they are pawns in a leftist conspiracy against Australia.
His choice of envoy for Indigenous people was obviously more an excuse to get former PM Tony Abbott as far away from Canberra than achieve anything. Now, Tony Abbott does have a real concern for Indigenous people, and his heart is full of good intentions. But you know which road is paved with good intentions.
People, as individuals or groups, don’t like to be forced, they don’t like to be told what to think. Resistance is the natural outcome. The only way forward, to avoiding the problems of the past, is to listen to the Indigenous people and to work with them for better outcomes.
Let us treat them as adults and fellow citizens, rather than unthinking clay to be moulded in our hands.
The debate about the date of Australia Day is only a smaller symptom of a wider problem about the relationship between the government and our First People.
Simon Fleming
Griffith
We should stop foreign aid
With all the ongoing serious problems our farmers going through, how long will it take for our weak government to recognise or admit the problem exists?
Many good Australians are losing their livelihoods and many are losing their families and more tragically their lives.
Foreign aid is a one-way street and Australians only give and not receive.
This has got to stop – there’s the old saying that "charity begins at home".
Brendan Farrell has been doing his hay run for three years and no government official has been smart enough to know what is going on.
We should cease all foreign aid immediately and look after our own.
I urge all Australians to make a stand with the view of securing our future and more importantly the future of our children and grandchildren.