Labor’s new low: NT government plays the race card

When Lisa Simpson decides to become a vegetarian she announces her decision to a pretty unsupportive Simpson family.

Homer responds: Wait a minute... Lisa honey, are you saying you are never going to eat any animal again? What about bacon?

Lisa: No!

Homer: Ham?

Lisa: No!

Homer: Pork Chops!?

Lisa: Dad, those all come from the same animal!

Homer: Yeah right Lisa, a wonderful “magical” animal. He he.

Lisa’s new way of life comes on the eve of a huge barbecue Homer is planning in order to gain substantially more power and influence in Springfield.

Virtually everyone is invited.

Lisa sees an irresistible opportunity to impose her high moral standards on half the town in one hit, so she implores her father not to serve meat.

“You don’t win friends with salad,” he responds.

Homer Simpson, the pragmatist, would probably do alright in Northern Territory politics.

Up there, you don’t win elections with blackfellas. In the Territory, you win elections by kicking the crap out of them.

To understand why, NIT readers ‘from the south’ need a crash course in Northern Territory politics and, importantly, the single most vital skill to surviving within it - the ability to ‘dog whistle’.

In 1997 - more than two decades after the CLP first formed government in the Territory - CLP Chief Minister, Shane Stone told the Northern Territory News that Aboriginal itinerants deserved to be “monstered and stomped on”.

During his reign as Chief Minister, Stone also publicly described Galarrwuy Yunupingu - one of the nation’s most respected Aboriginal leaders - as “just another whinging, whining black”.

His predecessor - and the NT’s first chief minister - Paul Everingham was only marginally more subtle.

In the late 1980s, Everingham told Territorians that the bicentenary of the arrival of Captain Cook was something Aboriginal people should celebrate because had white Australians not arrived “Aboriginal fathers would still be bashing out their daughters’ skulls on rocks”.

It’s probably not an over-statement to say the CLP will need a few more years to shed the tag of the most redneck political party in the country.

Indeed, even today, CLP members occasionally land themselves in trouble when they’re let out in public.

CLP candidate for the Darwin seat of Millner, Paul Mossman told ABC radio on Monday that he “regrets” comments he made on the internet last month when, while participating in a debate on the Inside Politics website, he wrote that a 13-year-old girl denied an abortion should have “kept her legs closed in the first place”.

Even so, the occasional brain explosion aside, the CLP is generally a lot more subtle when it comes to spraying a little venom about the Top End.

Most political commentators agree that of the nine elections staged in the NT so far, the CLP has played the race card in at least seven of them.

One of the more famous strategies was to call on Territorians to “Rock Canberra”. It was during the early 1980s, when debate was heating up over federal Labor’s plans to hand back Uluru to its traditional owners.

As part of their re-election campaign, the CLP reminded the electorate that ‘the Rock belongs to all Territorians’.

In political terms, what the CLP did was play the race card, also known as dog whistling.

We’ll let Dr Chris Burns, a current member of the NT government (and the ALP cabinet minister who earlier this year described a parliamentary opponent who was the victim of child sexual abuse as a “poofter”) take up the story to explain what dog whistling means. In October 2002, Dr Burns told the NT parliament: “The mischievous use of Aboriginal issues or the race card has long been a favourite political tactic of the CLP. It might not necessarily be overt. I have read a book by Don Watson. It is a biography of Paul Keating, and it is a very interesting book. I will quote from him on page 712. He said: ‘We spent the campaign circling the issue of race, knowing that our opponents had engaged in a campaign of dog whistling, although we did not know the term at that stage and without it, could not describe, with much assurance, what was going on.’

“Now he talks about what dog whistling is: ‘It was the unspoken message which rafts of Australians, many of whom later became supporters of Pauline Hanson, recognised in coalition advertising and the slogan ‘for all of us’.”

Dog whistling is not the perfect political weapon - it’s a strategy that can easily backfire.

The message has got to be subtle enough to avoid providing conclusive proof that you are trying to vilify a race of people.

But the code can’t be too hard to crack - its intended target, the redneck, isn’t exactly known for his or her ability to detect subtle forms of communication.

So rather than saying “Our party is going to lock-up the blacks who keep harassing you on the streets”, a good political dog whistle sounds a little more like “Our party stands for safer streets and no hum-bugging or harassment of our citizens and tourists”.

In short, the trick is to get the frequency of the dog whistle just right.

If you overdo it, you won’t just attract the attention of the dogs, you’ll awaken an army of angry lefties.

Sad to say, that’s precisely what has occurred in the NT in the past week.

If the CLP has made an art form out of dog whistling, then the ALP is the Leonardo Da Vinci of complaining about it. After 27 years in Opposition, it would be impossible to determine how many times the ALP has accused the CLP of playing the race card, but the answer is somewhere in the hundreds, if not thousands.

NT Labor has defined itself on its opposition to race-based policies and race-laced election campaigns.

In its long years in Opposition, Aboriginal issues and its Aboriginal constituents were the oxygen in the lungs of the ALP.

Of course, in 2005 the roles are reversed - it is the ALP that is seeking re-election. But unlike the CLP, Clare Martin’s government faces a ‘special challenge’.

To win government in the Top End, you’ve got to win what’s called the Northern Suburbs - seven seats north of Darwin City.

With just 25 seats in total, performing strongly in the Northern Suburbs means you’re already more than halfway to forming government. And today, six ALP parliamentarians and three ministers hold Northern Suburbs seats.

Traditionally, the Northern Suburbs is home to the more conservative voters in the Territory. History has shown that to get their attention - and hang onto your seat - you’ve got to at least appear to be tough on the blackfellas (but not too tough - the CLP’s mandatory sentencing policy lost them the last election).

This is where life gets complicated for the ALP.

Without the black vote (Aboriginal people are fast approaching 40 percent of the population) the ALP wouldn’t even be in the hunt for the Northern Suburbs. Not all Aboriginal people vote Labor, but a substantial majority do and have done for decades.

Aboriginal people have paid a high price for that loyalty. The CLP were notorious for punishing the Aboriginal institutions that actively supported the ALP while ignoring those areas that remained Labor strong-holds.

So when Clare Martin’s ALP was elected to power in 2001, there was a real expectation among Aboriginal people that their turn had finally arrived, that the debt they’ve been owed for almost three decades might finally be repaid.

But how does Clare Martin on the one-hand appease the white voters, without upsetting the blackfellas?

If she doesn’t win the Northern Suburbs, then it’s all been for nought.

Could she risk playing both sides of politics and hope no-one realised it before the end of the election campaign?

Martin didn’t even try.

She lasted less than 24 hours.

On the first day of the election campaign - and bear in mind this is the first time in history the ALP has ever sought re-election in the Territory - Clare Martin and the ALP government folded.

They played the race card.

Martin announced a new policy that would crack down on the significant problems confronting all Territorians - itinerants or, according to Clare Martin, “habitual drunks”.

Or if you believe in dog whistling, the blacks.

In the week since the policy was announced, NT government media advisers have been at pains to point out that the new Anti-Social Behaviour Act “does not criminalise alcoholism”.

Someone should probably have told Clare Martin that because here’s what she had to say in her media release on June 1, under the headline ‘Habitual drunks will get treatment or face jail’:

Habitual drunks will receive treatment or face jail, following the introduction of a tough new Anti-Social Behaviour Act, Chief Minister Clare Martin announced today.

“No one likes being humbugged by drunks in our streets - anti-social behaviour is simply unacceptable,” said Ms Martin.

“Today I announce Labor will introduce an Anti-Social Behaviour Act with a range of new powers to deal with habitual drunks.

“We will introduce new police powers to issue Prohibition Orders against habitual drunks - if a person who is the subject of a Prohibition Order is found guilty of committing an offence whilst drinking in a public place, they will be required to get treatment or face jail.”

The remainder of the press statement is, admittedly, less confrontational. It acknowledges that alcohol abuse causes devastation across the Territory and that the government will pump more money into rehabilitation services.

Five hundred thousand dollars, in fact.

And $5 million into police... you do, after all, have to catch the nimble “habitual drunks” first before you can treat them.

The question anyone with an interest in Aboriginal rights needs to ask is this: If the Martin government wasn’t seeking to give the impression it would criminalise alcoholism and lock up drunks, why was precisely that statement included in the headline of Martin’s press release and the very first paragraph?

If the Martin government really was seeking to help alcoholics, why wasn’t the headline ‘Martin government promises alcoholics a better future’?

As Homer says, ‘You don’t win friends with salad’. And as Rupert says, ‘If it bleeds, it leads.’

We may never know why Clare Martin opted for the brick-bat headline on a policy that purports to help our good friend, the “habitual drunk”, but in reality the answer’s not all that important.

Clare Martin will never concede she played the race card, and her critics - this paper among them - will never accept she didn’t.

A stalemate? Well, not quite.

Where the NT government may come undone is in how and why the Anti-Social Behaviour Package came into being, and most importantly, when.

If it emerges that it was a last minute policy hastily pulled together, then the ALP has some explaining to do.

Did the ALP, for example, create the policy (as some commentators have already suggested) as a knee-jerk reaction to the CLP’s early run in the election campaign on law and order?

Or was it, as internal ALP sources suggest, simply a hasty reaction to recent internal party polling which showed the ALP was in danger in key marginal seats in the Northern Suburbs of Darwin?

Or was it, as the government maintains, simply a well-planned and considered policy that took months in the making... and we’ve all got the wrong idea?

Professor David Carment, from Charles Darwin University, is the nation’s leading expert on Northern Territory politics.

He’s as perplexed as anyone.

“I don’t know where it came from, it puzzled me as well,” Professor Carment said.

“I can only interpret it as a knee-jerk reaction to statements the CLP were making.”

Professor Carment agreed it was possible the ALP’s new position was also a response to internal party polling showing the ALP was in trouble in the Northern Suburbs, but regardless he expressed doubt the policy would win the ALP any new voters.

“I don’t think it’s going to have any great effect either way. I think the kind of people concerned about law and order issues are probably likely to support the CLP.”

Why the ALP rushed out the policy on the first day of the campaign may also never be known, so let’s move to the question of when the ALP first began work on its new policy.

Earlier this week media in the NT, spurred on by accusations from the CLP, began to smell a rat.

ABC Radio reported on Sunday that “Northern Territory Chief Minister Clare Martin has denied Country Liberal Party accusations that Labor’s proposals to deal with anti-social behaviour are policy on the run”.

The CLP’s Stephen Dunham claims a mailbox drop by the ALP in Darwin over the weekend made no reference to the proposed anti-social behaviour laws.

“If the Chief Minister is correct in talking to one of her former ministers Jack Ah Kit about how important this was and the detail that they were going to put into it ... they would have it in their policy,” Dunham told ABC.

“The fact that it’s missing vindicates our strong belief that this policy is being made up in the last couple of days.”

Clare Martin’s response wasn’t exactly convincing - she relied on the claim that it “takes time to print brochures”.

“I’ve seen the brochures that are going out next week - it spells out exactly what we’re doing and you don’t put things in brochures before you’ve announced them,” she told the ABC.

Ms Martin said the policy has been developed over a long period.

“We’re proud of the policy, it’ll be in brochures for everyone next week.

“You’ll find in campaigns that they’re continuous, and once you get brochures printed they go out - sometimes there can be a delay in that - but the next lot are ready to go and they’ll be going out next week.”

But the ALP policy was announced on June 1. The brochures didn’t go out until June 4. Surely Clare Martin isn’t asking Territorians to believe that having had four years to prepare for the election, the ALP has decided that rather than pre-print its policies, it would prefer to wait until it publicly announces them, then rush to the printers and pump the jobs through as fast as possible, knowing that “sometimes there can be a delay”?

Is the ALP that disorganised? And if the answer is yes, should they be managing billions of dollars in taxpayer funds?

When NIT delved a little further into the allegations of ‘policy on the run’, a spokesperson for the NT government referred NIT to public comments Martin purportedly made last week (which we could not locate), to the effect that work had begun on the policy “within the last month”.

In case you need help with the math, ‘last month’ was May, and May ended last week.

So NIT tried to pin the spokesperson down to a specific date - was it 28 days ago, 14 days ago, seven days ago?

The adviser ended the phone call.

If the ALP did rush the anti-social behaviour policy through as a knee-jerk reaction to the CLP or a panicked response to a bad poll, then where did they get the policy from?

Is it really a policy that such a disorganised party could cobble together in just a few days?

The NT government has admitted the Anti-Social Behaviour Package was borne, in part, from an existing government strategy which has been successfully tackling the problem of Aboriginal itinerancy for several years.

In 2003, the NT government launched the ‘Return to Home program’, a part of a broader social order strategy called the Community Harmony project.

One of the main aims of the project is to bring about a significant reduction in the incidence of anti-social behaviour by itinerants in all major Territory centres.

Retiring Aboriginal Minister, John Ah Kit gave Parliament a glowing report on the program in October last year.

“The Return to Home program commenced in Darwin in May 2003 and, since its introduction, 1566 people have been assisted to return to their homes - 392 clients returned home between July and September 2004.

“The Return to Home program was identified as a key initiative of the Community Harmony strategy to provide assistance for people to easily access the opportunity of returning to their home community.

“The program also commenced in Katherine in February this year. Through the Kalano Community Association, 139 people have accessed the Return to Home program in the Katherine region. In Alice Springs, the Return to Country program, run through the Tangentyere Council, has also seen positive results.

“This program is an effective, essential service which is helping itinerants to travel home and in many cases, live productive and meaningful lives.

“We have been successful. We will continue to alleviate antisocial behavioural problems. We have put infrastructure in place, we are putting programs together, we are being very positive.”

But as all good governments should, the Community Harmony project has undergone a major review to ensure it remains effective.

That was completed earlier this year and its findings and recommendations were provided to the government and the Community Harmony Working Group - a ‘board’ of Indigenous stakeholders who run the project.

Late on Tuesday evening, NIT asked the government to publicly release the findings of that review.

The government refused.

The reason, ALP party sources have told NIT, is that the findings of the review are not in line with the government’s new policy.

While the Working Group has discussed the use of “compulsory care order measures” - the capacity to compel a person to receive treatment for drug dependence - that measure was not recommended by the review.

But that measure is the cornerstone of the ALP’s new policy.

NIT also understands that none of the members of the Working Group were aware the government was planning to change the Community Harmony program prior to the election, let alone announce it as part of a new policy.

Sharon Payne is the Director of the North Australian Aboriginal Legal Aid Service (NAALAS).

“I am... a member of the working group and a key stakeholder,” Ms Payne said.

“The people managing the project weren’t consulted.

“The funding body (Department of Community Services) knew nothing about [the policy change].

“Mission Australia didn’t know their control (of one part of the program) was being taken away.

“There’s been absolutely no consultation. The first I heard about this was as a news item.”

It’s inconceivable that the NT government would work on such an important policy for “months” without notifying any of the stakeholders. That fact is not lost on Ms Payne, who is furious at the government’s snap announcement.

“I was just in shock. This is a cynical, political knee-jerk reaction.

“I believe the Labor Party did some market research and found out law and order matters that were being raised by the CLP were having some impact (on the ALP’s chances for re-election).

“So without informing anybody, this is what they did.

“The fact is, we relied on [the ALP] because of how they said they would support Aboriginal issues.

“Now we just feel totally humiliated.”

Ms Payne said Aboriginal people were taking ownership of the problem of itinerancy through the Community Harmony project, but that could all now be derailed.

“They talk about zero tolerance. The fact is, in the circle sentencing court you’ll see zero tolerance from the community.

“If the community gets a chance to express it, they say no more humbug. But they do it in the context of also supporting the people to get better.

“They hate the sins, but they love the sinner.

“But [the ALP] is just hating the sinner, and encouraging other people to as well.”

Ms Payne is also angry at the impact the ALP policy may have on Aboriginal candidates in the election.

“People like Matthew Bonson (the Aboriginal member for the seat of Millner) had nothing to do with this.

“He’s got the closest margin (1.2 percent). He’s the most vulnerable. He counted on the Aboriginal support when he won last time.

“He’s a really wonderful young person with great leadership qualities who we would really want to support.

“But how do you support him without supporting his party?

“People are absolutely shell-shocked. They have no idea how to respond. It was so unexpected.”

Professor Carment doesn’t have a solution either.

“As far as Indigenous voters are concerned, I suspect a number of them aren’t happy with what the government has been saying and doing,” he said.

“Of course, not all Indigenous people vote Labor, but the majority do. I’m just wondering where they would direct their vote if they don’t support Labor.

“They’ve got to look for other options and I don’t think at this stage other options are very prevalent.”

Tracker Tilmouth - one of the Northern Territory’s best known and most respected Aboriginal leaders - is hoping voters don’t find other options.

Tracker is a long-serving member of the ALP and he remains hopeful his party will win the election.

“Definitely, but you don’t sell your kids to win the grand final,” Tracker said.

“Aboriginal people had a relationship with the ALP, even though it was a rocky one.

“It was a marriage, and like all marriages sometimes you struggle.

“But the marriage license is about to be torn up between the Aboriginal community and the Labor Party.”

Tracker is the only member of the ALP - both at a Territory and federal level - who agreed to speak to NIT on the record.

But his sentiments echo precisely those of more than two dozen ALP figures - some of them very senior - who to spoke to NIT.

Tracker broke ALP ranks earlier this week and he doesn’t look like jumping back into line any time soon. And like Sharon Payne - not to mention the CLP - Tracker is also convinced his party is making up policy ‘on the run’.

“I think it’s extremely disappointing from an Aboriginal perspective,” he said.

“Whilst there is a need [for the Labor Party] to win the election the issue of dealing with Aboriginal people, itinerants and drunks is a social problem that needs greater thought than last minute policy.

“There’s enough legislation in the Northern Territory to lock you up for almost anything - there’s no need to introduce more draconian measures.

“The people who need help the most shouldn’t be going to jail the most.

“You’re locking up people who’ve got an illness. The illness is alcoholism. It’s a disease - it’s been notified as a disease.

“So to treat the disease you have dry out shelters. You can’t lock up people for a disease.

“We don’t lock people up for having cancer. Imagine the outcry if someone was diagnosed with breast cancer and got locked up for it.”

Tracker said he would not quit the Labor Party, rather he intended to fight internally for reform.

“I won’t resign, but I’ll be having plenty to say about it,” he said.

“Everyone else has been gagged by the sound of it, but that’s not unusual in the Northern Territory.

“Some Aboriginal people have decided to go quiet and some have decided to stand up and talk.

“There’s a principle at issue here. You can’t keep picking on the most disadvantaged part of the community.”

Despite Tracker’s seniority in the party, he was also totally unaware his party was about to drop a bucket on Aboriginal people.

“I had no indication whatsoever,” he said.

“We had policies from branches and conferences to suggest these sorts of legislative and draconian measures - the stuff that comes from a CLP government - would not be introduced by a Labor.

“We’ve had these sorts of undertaking from day dot.”

So was it dog whistling? Has the ALP played the race card?

“It’s a call to the people, for whom human rights isn’t a great issue, to join their merry band of men.”

Other ALP sources - all of whom asked not to be named - were far less restrained.

The depth of feeling on this issue within the ALP was described by one member as “absolutely unprecedented”.

“Offensive,” was another. Mortified, disgraceful, moronic, disgusting, disloyal, stupid and appalling are also words that featured prominently in discussions.

The outrage from within the ALP can’t just simply be passed off as mischief-making by the faction which most dislikes Clare Martin - the ALP left.

No-one wants to win government more than the left. To them, five minutes under the rule of the CLP is a fate worse than death, let alone another four years.

The truth is, Martin has outraged members in all factions.

Two ALP members confirmed to NIT that there would be “payback”, but not until after the election.

“For a start, the people who put this together inside the campaign had better make plans to leave.

“They have disgraced the rank and file of the party. They’re not wanted here.”

Another senior ALP source said there would be challenge to Clare Martin’s leadership and it would come “before Christmas”.

Not that Clare Martin is looking that far ahead.

Her biggest hurdle - and certainly her most immediate - is polling day on June 18.

If Sharon Payne’s anger is anything to go by, then Clare Martin should be nervous.

“There’s absolute hatred for Clare Martin in the Aboriginal community at the moment,” Ms Payne said.

“We’ve got Johnnie in Canberra and George in Washington. We don’t need Clare in Darwin,” says Ms Payne.

“Our dream outcome would be Labor wins, but Clare Martin loses her seat.”

With a margin of almost 10 percent, the Member for Fannie Bay is reasonably insulated from a voter backlash.

Her numbers in the ALP party room, however, don’t appear anywhere near as comfortable.

The ALP’s statement

NORTHERN TERRITORY: The facts surrounding the Anti Social Behaviour Package include:

• The government estimates that between 100 and 200 people across the Territory “fit the description of habitual drunks”.

• If someone is taken into police custody for “grog-related reasons” six times in three months, they will have a Prohibition Order placed on them.

• If a person with a Prohibition Order placed on them is then found guilty of committing an offence while drinking in a public place, they will be required to get treatment or face jail.

• The government will provide an additional $560,000 a year for alcohol treatment services.

• An “alcohol court” will be established that will specialise in dealing with the devastation alcohol causes, at a cost of $200,000 a year.

• Funding for rehabilitation will increase to $640,000 in 2008-09.

• Police will receive an additional $5 million a year in extra funding.

Ah Kit’s reasoning

NORTHERN TERRITORY: Outgoing ALP member John Ah Kit has claimed the government would be considered “racist” if it did nothing to combat the problems “habitual drunks” are facing.

Mr Ah Kit told ABC radio:

• “It’s racist if we don’t do anything about it.”

• “We cannot sit on our hands, we have to get a bit tough with these habitual drunks.”

• “When I see people - my people - begging, swearing, accusing, sleeping on the concrete, defecating here and there, I feel ashamed.”

• “I feel embarrassed and I don’t want to see that happen in the Northern Territory.”

ALP candidate for the seat of Arnhem, Barbara McCarthy said:

• “Alcohol is without question one of the most destructive issues within our communities. Grog is so destructive on family life, it affects the health and education of our children, and it erodes the strength of Aboriginal culture.”

• “This policy is about choice. About each individual recognising the impact that irresponsible drinking has on those around them.”

• “Choose to rehabilitate or face the consequences of a custodial sentence.”

• “I know it’s tough love - but it’s badly needed.”

* Chris Graham is the editor of the National Indigenous Times newspaper.

Newshawk: http://www.napnt.org/election2005.html
Pubdate: Thur, 09 Jun 2005
Source: National Indigenous Times
Author: Chris Graham
Website: http://www.nit.com.au
Email: mail@nit.com.au