Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Treaty Commissioner Tony McAvoy speaks about the handing down of the report outlining the path to treaty

Transcript

Treaty Commissioner Tony McAvoy speaks about the handing down of the report outlining the path to treaty · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We do know that the landmark report is going to
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: be released today outlining the path to treaty between the
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Northern Territory Government and Indigenous territorians. Treaty Commissioner Tony McAvoy
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: says that the clear message from years of consultation is
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: the need for multiple treaties securing the sovereign status of
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: First Nations people and facilitating their self government. Now, the
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Treaty Commissioner Tony McAvoy joins me on the line right now.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Good morning to you, Tony.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: Morning, Katie, how are you, yeah.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Really well, thanks so much for joining us today, Tony,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: What has been the clear message from people that you've consulted.
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: With, The very clear messages that First Nations Aboriginal people
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: of the Northern Territory want to be able to make
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: decisions for themselves about their existence and that sits very
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: neatly and appropriately with the international and now domestic understandings
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: of what self determination and self government really meant.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: And I know that there has been a lot of consultation.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: We're talking a couple of years, I believe for a
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: few years worth of consultation. Who has been consulted with
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: and how extensively has that happened.
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: So the report, which is released today to the public
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: outlines the vast extent of the consultation that was undertaken
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: by the Treaty Commission before my arrival. So I commenced
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: work in the Treaty Commission in December twenty twenty one,
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: and as had all been undertaken before I arrived, but
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: there was a consultation all around the territory. And since
• 1:42
  Speaker 3: my arrival into the role, I have met with Land Council's,
• 1:48
  Speaker 3: community organizations, ministers, advisors, the Anti Opposition leader and the
• 1:58
  Speaker 3: Shadow Minister of the Treaty. I have met with community
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: education facilities such as Bachelor Institute, Tea Ley College. I've
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: met with many community organizations and they conferred The Aberaginal
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: community organizations have all concerned their desire to be in
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: a position where they have a much stronger say about
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: their exist intend and I must say that my experience
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: from the members of the government that I've spoken to
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: has been largely very positive, which has led to me
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: indicating to the Minister of the Treaty that I'm willing
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: to participate further and provide advice as needed to the
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: government about this transition.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: To the next stage.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Tony. I know that some people listening this morning might
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: be thinking, you know, what exactly does it mean? What
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: does a treaty mean? And what is it going to
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: mean for the Northern terra.
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: What I've recommended is that there be a territory wide agreement,
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: and in some places those agreements are called can be
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: called treaties. And in that territory wide agreement there will
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: be set out all the rules and the minimum standards
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: by which individual first nations can negotiate their own treaty
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: with the territory government and hopefully with the Commonwealth government.
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: And what that will involve.
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: Is a range of things. Usually we know from international experience.
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: It involves some discussion about the way in which self
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: government has exercised. But it also.
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: Involves the transition of power so that.
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: Those communities get to make decisions for themselves. It involves
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: the transition of resources so that they have their funds
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: to do the things that need to be done. It
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: involves reparation for past activities, and there are international models
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: for how those reparations are calculated. And these discussions in
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: that respect that I foreshadowed in the report are no
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: different to the discussions that are being held right now
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: in Victoria by the Victorian First People Assembly with the
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: Victorian Government about what their treaty framework might look like.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: Tony, there is you know, discussion at different times that
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: you know that sometimes, you know, movements like this can
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: be more virtue signaling than real opportunity or real change
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: for Indigenous Territorians. Will this you know, if we are
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: able to get to the point where the path is
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: forged ahead and you know a treaty between the Northern
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Territory government and Indigenous Territorians is indeed does indeed happen?
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: You know, do you think that this will make real
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: change to the lives of Territorians and not just be
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: a situation where it feels as though it's a symbol.
• 5:07
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, it will make real change. There's the people who
• 5:13
  Speaker 3: talk about virtue signaling through the treaty process do not
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: have a real deep understanding of the consequences of living
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: in a on your own country as a disempowered person,
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: and Aboriginal people across Australia understand that the true damage
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: that that does to our communities where decisions are made
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: in Darwin or our springs about the allocation of resources.
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: It is so disempowering. And one of the things that
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: came from very clear in the consultation is how how
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: deeply hurt Abiginal people were in communities all across the
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: Northern Territory by the removal of their community council the
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: creation of the super Shires, and that had an effect
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: right down on the ground level about how people engage,
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: where jobs were placed, what things are goodten priority, and
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: so it's far from virtue signaling. It's almost the opposite
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: of virtue signaling in my assessment, Tony.
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: What are the steps now? What is the pathway forwards here?
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: So there are a number of things that need to happen.
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: As first steps, and they can happen at the same
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: time in my view, and that's the way I've expressed
• 6:35
  Speaker 3: it in the report. Firstly is that the Treaty Commissioners
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: at twenty twenty has done its job and it needs.
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: To be replaced by what I've labeled a Treaty.
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: And Truth Commission Act and a truth telling process be
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: established in the Northern Territory so that the stories of
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: those old people who still remember the things that happened
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: the Northern Territory, and there are many of those people
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: still around get to tell those stories if they want to,
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: and have them recorded so that they don't pass into
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: the into the cobbles of history. And so that's that's
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: an important first step there, establishing of the Treaty and
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: Truth Commission Act.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: That The second thing is that.
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: I've recommended that there'd be a territory wide First Nations
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: forward and bring all these first nations together so that
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: they can decide what a first Nation's voice for the
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: Northern Territory will look like. And there's a there's a
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: number of different ways that that can happen, and I
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: reached the view that it was not for me to
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: make decisions about how what that looked like. It had
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: to be come from the Northern Territory.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: First nation of people. So we will I expect to see.
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: A body, maybe not this similar to the First People
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: Ascended Victoria or the National First Nation's Mois to Parliament.
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: I expect to see that being established in the in
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: the Northern Territory in the in the near future.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: Tony, how important is it that we get these right
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: in the Northern Territory.
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: For the future of the territory. I think this is
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: the This is a once in a generation opportunity. The
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: circumstances which exist here in the Northern Territory don't exist
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: anywhere else in Australia where you have you had this
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: situation here where last huge amounts of the territory are
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: owned already owned by Abridginal people through the Aberage Landline
• 8:52
  Speaker 3: Tact and through the native tidal processes including the coastal waters.
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: You have regional councils where that most of the councilors
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: across all of the councils our Aboriginal people, have been
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: democratically elected. You have a cabinet which is one made
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: up one third of Aboriginal people, and the population which
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: is one for our Aboriginal people. This is the place
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: where proper, respectful change can happen and it can sertainly
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: lead the way and show the rest of the country
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: how to do it. Problem well.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: Treaty Commissioner Tony McAvoy, We really appreciate your time this morning.
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much for having a chat with us, and
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: no doubt there is going to be a lot more
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: discussion throughout the day as that report is indeed handed down.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having a chat.
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: With me and thank you very much for the time
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: to speak to your listeners.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: Thanks Tony, we appreciate it.