Council calls for holiday program to combat petrol sniffing

An Aboriginal council in Alice Springs is calling on the Northern Territory Government to introduce school holiday programs in Aboriginal communities to help combat petrol sniffing.

Tristan Ray who works with petrol sniffers for the Tangentyere Council says the Territory Government is spending a lot of money on sport and recreational programs in communities which he says are rarely being delivered.

Mr Ray says the money would be better spent on a systematic school holiday program to prevent the boredom that often leads to sniffing.

"During school holidays in remote communities it's a really boring time," he said.

"The one institution that sort of has got something for young people going and there's really nothing to do, particularly in summer time people go out for business for initiation of young men and that takes away many of the leaders from the communities and the younger people are left with very little to do.

"And what happens subsequently is lots of break-ins lots of property damage and lots of petrol sniffing.

"School holiday programs are an inexpensive and very practical way to deal with that, we've provided them to many of the key communities over the last few years but there's been no systematic provision of funding for that."

Newshawk: http://www.napnt.org
Pubdate: Mon, 09 May 2005
Source: Australian Broadcasting Corporation (Australia Web)
Copyright: 2005 Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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