This article first appeared in The Australian, 31 January 2007

Key to unrest is policy failure

Wesley Aird

When political masters create bad policy or they just can't be bothered to resource or administer an issue properly, it is often the police who have to clean up the mess. When it all goes wrong the policymakers should claim their share of responsibility and embark on corrective action.

The police and the indigenous community have been very vocal in the recent debate surrounding Palm Island. What we haven't heard enough of is how the Beattie Government intends to put in place policies and resources to overcome indigenous disadvantage.

In Queensland, the relationship between police and the indigenous community is at a low point. This is no surprise given the recent news that a Queensland police officer is to be charged for manslaughter over the 2004 death in custody of Mulrunji Doomadgee on Palm Island.

After his death, the already strained relations became very public and extremely acrimonious.

Both sides had drawn their lines in the sand long ago. Many remote---and even not so remote---indigenous communities face complex issues of law, order and justice every day. Inter-woven are drunkenness and violence that in many communities are never too far away. In fairness, we shouldn't expect police to be social workers, though we do expect them to maintain order. They are expected to keep the peace, not necessarily make it. In small communities the establishment of order is, in large part, the responsibility of the local government.

Here's where things turn murky. For decades successive Queensland governments maintained indigenous communities in dysfunction. Indigenous communities have been legislatively unlike all other local governments across the state. Matters are made worse when they are removed from the real economy, through remoteness and a lack of economies of scale. This means law and order becomes that much harder to maintain. In a social sense, things break down.

It is against this backdrop that police go about their day-to-day business in indigenous communities as representatives of the state. They are meant to uphold the law and operate within it, which no doubt poses challenges.

Discussions of policing in indigenous communities are frequently polarised along the lines of under-resourcing versus over-policing. The irony is that pouring resources into the police service, which in turn targets services in indigenous communities, can be far more expensive than building the capacity of the communities. A community with purpose and with its social fabric intact is able to exert a positive influence on its members. This is all the better when matched with good governance and a real economy.

People are more interested in getting on with their lives than they are in causing trouble. The positive community influence can be stronger than anything the police service is capable of achieving by punitive reactions.

For their part the indigenous communities must look broadly for assistance. Governments can't fix everything and in many cases there can be great benefit from industry or philanthropy. There are many indigenous people who want to improve their prospects for the future and are willing to work with government and others to do so. They are sick of welfare and hopelessness.

Positive change in Queensland is not likely unless a number of matters are addressed by the state Government. There must be improvements in community governance. There must be changes to land tenure legislation, to enable indigenous people to enter the economy with financial security. Greater efforts must be made in education to break the welfare cycle. To add another layer of complexity, the community must be a genuine partner in the changes.

If there is to be change for the better anytime soon, it will require improvements in policy, resources and bureaucratic commitment. The good news is that the public servants delivering many of the day-to-day services to indigenous communities are employees of the state Government, not the commonwealth. Therefore, when the Beattie Government gets serious about overcoming indigenous disadvantage, things can move fairly quickly.

Perhaps a good way to start would be by acknowledging that remote and semi-remote indigenous communities have particular problems that aren't going to be fixed under the one-size-fits-all bureaucratic approach. It is time for a new outlook. This problem can't be fixed just by renaming a department, in Queensland's case changing a word in a portfolio title from policy to partnerships. It takes technical know-how, not career bureaucrats. But changes in policy can bring about positive change in communities.

Wesley Aird is a member of the National Indigenous Council, the Gold Coast Native Title Group and the Bennelong Society board. The views are his own.