PRIME MINISTER
TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER, THE HON P J KEATING, MP
INTERVIEW WITH! PAUL LYNEHAM, 7: 30 REPORT, 13 MARCH 1992
E OE PROOF COPY'
PL: Prime Minister, welcome again to the program.
PM: Thank you Paul.
PL: At your news conference this morning you talked
directly to the Australian people and you linked race
relations with the question of our national identity.
What were you getting at there?
PM: Just that I don't think that we are going to be certain
who we are and be able to describe ourselves as ' One
Nation' until we come to terms with this problem of the
relations between Aboriginal Australians and non-
Aboriginal Australians.
PL: Why not? Surely white Australia has got a pretty good
idea who and what it is.
PM: It hasn't got a good enough idea to understand that the
indigenous people of this country still live in
poverty, still lack opportunity, still feel aggrieved
and that I think does permeate Australian society and
unsettles: it as it ought to.
P: But isn't it uncomfortable but true to say that
Australia was in fact founded on the basis of racism?
We snatched this land off the Aborigines, we raped
them, we murdered them, we pushed them into the back
blocks and we haven't given them much of a go ever
since.
PM: I think there has been a conscientious view amongst
Australians from the time, at least of the adoption of
the Constitutional Amendment back in the late
that there should be, at least the financial power of
the Commonwealth, ought to be brought to bear upon this
problem. I think what's happened since is we've seen a
greater level of understanding by Australians about
Aboriginal culture, about the problems of Aboriginal
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life and a willingness on the part of the Australian
community, in general, to try to solve it.
PL: Yes, but which part of the Australian community? I
mean changing attitudes in Balmain or Carlton may be
one thing, in a lot of the out back towns its quite a
different thing isn't it?
PM: Probably that's true, but it's not as different as it
was. I think we ought to use this opportunity again,
this exercise as a turning point and just reflect upon
what this; must mean to the families of the people
involved and to ponder if that were the position of
anyone el~ se's family.
PL: A turningr point, you have also suggested that this was
a criticaLl time in Australian race relations. Why is
now so critical?
PM: It comes at the end of this long Royal Commission, 3 or
4 years of Aboriginal deaths in custody. It is, I
think an opportunity, probably the last opportunity in
this decade to come to terms with this problem. That's
why the Government is now working its way through these
recommendations and will respond fulsomely to them.
But again., it's as much in the mind as it is in
Commonwealth Budgetary programs or program delivery.
It has to be a willingness, I think, on the part of the
country of non-Aboriginal Australians to come to terms
with these problems, to give Aboriginal people
opportunities to take away this kind of attitude which
this incident has evoked.
PL: I heard that you said in Cabinet that this was a last
chance to get it right this decade?
PM: I did and I think it is. I think it deserves careful
and serious consideration and as well as that,
consultation with the States because I think the States
have got to be in this. A lot of the delivery of these
programs are with States and State governments. While
we will be responding to the law and justice issues of
the recommendations of the Commission in the first
instance, and they will be substantial, the underlying
causes of the problem about lack of job opportunities,
lack of fulfilment and the general living standards of
Aboriginal people, is an opportunity I think which the
second part of our response will provide.
PL: But if it's as much attitudes as money, what of the
argument that; despite all the fine words and the tears,
Federal Labor has basically failed the Aboriginal
people since 1983?
PM: We have dramatically increased funding to the area.
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PL: There are still people without taps, without basic
health services, all that money, all that rhetoric, all
that drama and you still have to walk 100 yards to get
cold water.
PM: Well this in some places is obviously true. But there
has been progress made and part of that has been while
we've been cutting the Commonwealth Budget back
dramatically through the ' 80s. We dramatically
increased funding to Aboriginal programs.
PL: We saw a hell of a lot of hair-brained schemes too
didn't we in recent years?
PM: I don't -think so.
PL: Properties failing, Aboriginal motels failing.
PM: No, what about the Community Development and Employment
Program CDEP I think that has been a very good
program, it's working, it's working well, we will
probably expand it when we respond in the second part
of our response. There has been, in terms of education
opportuniLties, there has been I think a lot of
successes in the 1980s.
PL: Still no treaty though or anything like it?
PM: No, but the reconciliation process is I think
important. The work of that body will be both in
attitudes and in program delivery, I think will be
important:. Again, ATSIC is now set up so that that
distribultion'is made on the basis of the priorities of
Aboriginal people and management by Aboriginal people.
So I think there has been quite a lot of progress, but
again not: enough.
PL: Even the latest submission to Cabinet in response to
the Deaths in Custody Royal Commission, can you
honestly say that it contains this sort of creative
vision with programs that really are going to stand a
change of breaking through, of breaking the cycle?
PM: I think you will have to wait and see what the
Government produces, Paul, and when it does it will
have that: creativity.
PL: But many Australians with the best will in the world
think there has been a lot of money shovelled at this
problem cover the years with very disappointing results.
PM: Well, there has been in absolute terms a lot of money,
but it is: still less than $ 5,000 per head of the
Aboriginal population. I mean, it is not as many
Australians imagine it to be. And therefore money is
still rather thinly spread and has to be sensibly
spent, and programs have to be well-designed and well-
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delivere-d. ' Where we are guaranteeing, I'll guarantee
you this: that at least in the response by the
Governmetnt to the recommendations of the Royal
Commission, the program design and delivery will be
carefully thought over, carefully evaluated, and
therefore our response, I hope and believe, will meet
many of these problems.
PL: You talk about the need for attitudes to change, Prime
Minister, what about the argument that it is about time
the Aborigines took stock of themselves as well?
Charlie Perkins says they should be doing a lot more to
look after themselves in terms of personal health,
skills, opening up more opportunities on their own
behalf. I
PM: Part of that comes with opportunity. It comes with
being part of society, having ones own wealth level and
the self est ' eem which comes from having that self
provision, if you like. I think one thing feeds upon
another, and obviously success in this area must
improve the lot of Aboriginal Australians. So, as they
become as individuals more self reliant, these things
will occur, rio doubt. But this is not generally true,
there is not the private provision by Aboriginals for
themselves as, say, commercial operators and ventures,
although this is true in some places. It is not
widespread. And giving them the opportunity to do
things in their own right, successfully, I think is
going to be Very important.
PL: But you said' the other day you were a conservative
family man. IHow would you like to be, say, walking
with your kids through an outback town to find the
local park fiill of drunken Aborigines, screaming abuse,
smashing bottles? A lot of people who watch this
program have' rung up with those sorts of stories. Now,
they've got as much right to tell us what's happening
in their community as anyone else, and it's not a
pleasant sight.
PM: No, but why are they like that? Because quite often
they don't know who they are, that society has cast
them off,, it doesn't want to know them, doesn't want to
employ them, they don't have a serious role in life.
PL: So they justispend the welfare checks down the pub?
PM: They just won der who they are. So that's why I think
it is important to get education there. On the basic
things education, health care, and the opportunity
through employment, employment experience, and wider
employment opportunities in enterprises which are run
by Aboriginals.
PL: But if we can still say this in ' 92 after Labor has
been in power for nearly a decade, it does suggest that
Labor has~ n't grasped the nettle on this doesn't it?
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PM: This has been a long standing problem. We've tried to
grasp it in terms of a monetary way, whether we've
succeeded in grasping in an attitudinal or an effective
way, I don't think we'd claim that. I think the Royal
Commission recommendations make that pretty obvious,
but what we will be doing is trying to meet those
recommendations and to measure up to the expectations
of the Aboriginal community in these respects.
PL: How much of a racist do you reckon the average Aussie
is these days?
PM: There are many Australians that are not racist at all
and racism I think is a diminishing thing in Australia.
I think this is a tolerant country and racism in this
country is I think less than other countries and there
is a willingness I think in this country to get along,
to understanding other peoples attitudes and problems
and to have regard for their ethnic backgrounds.
PL: Those who support the police in this situation, they
say they're the ones that have to pick them up off the
streets every Saturday night and fight them into the
cells and have a very unpleasant time of it, that it's
understandable perhaps that they should feel certain
negative attitudes towards black people in some
communities.
PM: It's not understandable that somebody who died the way
that David Gundy did or Lloyd Boney out of abject
depression should be depicted in the cruel way that
they were and in a way which must have brought
tremendous sadness and grief to their families. I'm
not sure many non-Aboriginal Australian families would
like that done to them.
PL: And should those two policemen still be in the police
force do you think?
PM: That's a matter for the NSW Government. The Minister
for Aboriginal Affairs told me this morning that the
Police Minister in NSW and the Commissioner of Police
in NSW were taking action against the 2 officers
concerned and they will make a judgement about it. But
they also told Robert Tickner that NSW will be
responding seriously to the Deaths in Custody Royal
Commission.
PL: And will the other States do you think?
PM: I think so, I certainly will be engaging them on the
problem.
PL: Urgent and top level talks?
PM: That was decided a week ago in Cabinet here, before
this matter arose.
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PL: And what if they say look, the Keating recession,
you've been squeezing us, we haven't got the money for
this?
PM: Well it's a matter of priorities. All Governments have
got monies, it's a matter of where their priorities are
and there can be, I think, no greater priority than
coming to terms with this real problem for us.
PL: Prime Minister, thank you.
PM: Thank you Paul.
ENDS