Aboriginal affairs has been completely missing from the eight-week election campaign – from both major parties. That’s despite Labor having a real opportunity to provide a point of difference from the disastrous reign of the Abbott and Turnbull governments. Prof Jon Altman is a research professor at the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University, Melbourne and an emeritus professor at the Australian National University in Canberra. He has also worked in Aboriginal policy over the past three decades and is one of our foremost experts on Indigenous policy.
He joined Amy McQuire to talk about the Coalition’s Community Development Programme – a ‘human rights abuse’ – that has lead to an exponential rise in penalties for Aboriginal jobseekers. Aboriginal people who have had serious breaches of the programme’s requirements are missing out on welfare payments for up to eight weeks.
We also spoke about the Minister for Indigenous affairs Nigel Scullion’s attack on NT land rights and his role in undermining the land councils.