Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister
KIERAN GILBERT, HOST: Let’s bring in the Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister. That’s Patrick Gorman. Patrick, thanks for your time. What we heard in Matt Cunningham’s report there and what we’ve seen in The Australian today and over recent days, the situation in Alice Springs is a crisis. There’s no other way to describe it. And now Marion Scrymgour, your fellow Labor MP, the member for Lingiari, says that while she supports the Voice, we can’t be having those discussions while this effectively, this humanitarian crisis unfolds in Alice Springs. What do you say to that?
PATRICK GORMAN, ASSISTANT MINISTER TO THE PRIME MINISTER: Well, firstly I would say every child deserves to have a safe home and no one should be experiencing what children and communities are right now in Alice Springs. And the reports are, as you say, shocking. But when it comes to, we’re a big country and we can deal with the immediate crises that are put before us at any one point in time and look at those longer term challenges and what we know when it comes to, indeed much of the work that Marion and others have done, which is that when you do policy, working together, co-design, you get better outcomes and that those policies last for longer. And so that’s what we’re trying to do with the Voice. And I think if you look at the Uluru Statement from the Heart, Marion is a signatory to that document. She helped put this together. She is part of this long standing campaign for constitutional recognition. And I’ll always back local members standing up for their community, advocating in our parliamentary democracy, as they should. But I think we all know that Australia is a big country. We always have to juggle many priorities. And when we see different types of crises around, whether it be natural disasters or communities having real challenges, we have to be able to do more than one thing.
GILBERT: We absolutely can. But the problem in this situation is that it goes to the very reason for why the Voice is being argued for, or lack of cases, some would argue. The Opposition Leader saying he wants to be clear on what sort of impact this will have for people in townships, in communities around the nation. And Marion Scrymgour said today the Voice couldn’t be further from people’s view up here because people are under siege in their own homes. And this is because that alcohol ban, in large part because the alcohol ban was overturned last year, should the Federal Government seek to intervene and return that ban so that kids can be safe and that domestic violence isn’t as rife as it is right now?
GORMAN: Well, I think obviously a range of those policies are led, as you pointed out, by state and territory governments, in this case, the Northern Territory Government. I know Marion and many others are talking to them right now about what needs to be done in that community, which she represents. I’m not going to sit here – I represent Perth in the Federal Parliament, I’m happy to listen in my role as Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister, but I’m not going to sit here and prescribe what we should be imposing upon communities, particularly in that sort of interventionist mechanism that you suggest. What I will do, though, is say that we know policy is better when it’s designed with communities. That’s the fundamental principle behind the Voice to Parliament and making sure it’s enshrined in the Constitution is to make sure that we actually start to show communities across this country who for more than a century have been told, you aren’t part of this federation. We did not include you in our foundational document. And to say, actually, we want to build this new partnership, and the Voice is about that new partnership. So while I recognise that it would be great to be able to sit here and say there are easy fixes to the problems that are being experienced in Alice Springs right now, I’m not going to do that.
GILBERT: But they certainly look like they need help. Should the Federal Police be deployed to provide that support?
GORMAN: Well, I understand that the Minister for Indigenous Australians, the Attorney General, met with the Mayor of Alice Springs last week to discuss through what can be done. So those conversations are ongoing. That is a very open and productive conversation. I’m not going to again deploy on this program the Federal Police in any particular direction.
GILBERT: Should the Prime Minister go to Alice himself and see what the situation is like on the ground?
GORMAN: Well, the Prime Minister travels across this country all the time. He visits every part of Australia. We’ve seen that. He’s been, not in Alice, but he’s been in parts of the Northern Territory on a very regular basis, so I’m not going to release his program for what he’ll do in the future. But I think Australians have seen that this is a Prime Minister that shows up. This is a Prime Minister who listens to communities when they have concerns that warrant the Federal Government’s attention, listens to his local MPs, including Marion Scrymgour, who does a wonderful job representing Lingiari in the Federal Parliament, but of course, also lets Ministers get on with their job. And I just mentioned that we’ve got the Attorney General, the Minister for Indigenous Australians, holding those conversations in the areas where it is in their responsibility, as you would expect.
GILBERT: Sure. You can lose people over this sort of thing, though, in terms of the Voice. I understand what you’re saying about the broader historical reason and the constitutional gap there, but you can lose a lot of people and a lot of support. If you’ve got the Member for Lingiari saying that this is not the view, it’s a long way from the view of people in Alice right now. If you can’t get her to say that this is a priority because of this crisis, you can lose a lot of people over a scenario like this.
GORMAN: But to make sure that your viewers and the Australian people know the full context, that she also 100 per cent supports the Voice. And she has said that today as well, because she knows that if we want to get to those deep structural changes that our country needs, because we know that many of our policy settings in a range of areas, when it comes to life outcomes for First Nations people, we’re not doing good enough. There’s a ten year life expectancy gap. If we want to get to those big transformative changes, we need to transform the way that we are running policy in this country and the Voice is about giving that.
GILBERT: If you want to listen to the voice of your colleague Marion Scrymgour, she wants those alcohol bans reinstated. That’s what the voice of one of your colleagues, the Federal Government, shouldn’t it be looking at ways it can override the Northern Territory, which is within its power to do? We saw the intervention happen before. Shouldn’t the Federal Government be looking at ways if they don’t see the benefit of an alcohol ban, as the experts are saying is needed, shouldn’t the Federal Government intervene?
GORMAN: I think we all know that we get better policy outcomes when you have Territory and Federal Government working together rather than arguing with one another. We’ve actually just been through the COVID years, we went through sort of two years of the Commonwealth and the states sort of jostling over things rather than trying to find ways to work together. And I just highlighted that we’ve got those conversations between Commonwealth, territory government, the local governments in Alice Springs, indeed, the local Member trying to look at, well, what is the appropriate policy response from the Commonwealth? We’ll continue to have those conversations. That’s an ongoing conversation.
GILBERT: Did you think the Top End should put the ban back in place? A mandatory ban to protect those kids and reduce the domestic violence which we’re seeing rampant in the top end.
GORMAN: I’m not going to give advice publicly on what I think the Territory Government should do. I don’t think that’s appropriate. Obviously, there are people who are vulnerable, people who are unable to get the support they need. There are people who are concerned for their welfare. There are a number of children involved in what we’re seeing in the reporting that we’ve been talking about and what’s happening on the ground there. I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to sort of prescribe a particular outcome. And I’m open to saying some people will come on your show and pretend they have the answer to every single question. I’m not going to sit here and pretend that I have the depth of briefing of every single …
GILBERT: But does the Federal Government understand and accept the urgency of this crisis right now in Alice.
GORMAN: Yeah. And as I said, we’ve had Ministers not just today, but last week, engaging deeply on these issues. I’ll continue to listen to Marion and others as the government continues to look at what is the most appropriate role for the Federal Government in these communities which are experiencing some really awful days. I’ll just say to everyone who’s in Alice, I think there are a lot of people looking to work and find the short term policy solutions. And I think we all know that this doesn’t prevent us from looking at those longer term things that we know will give us better outcomes for the future. And when it comes to the question of the Voice, that is about saying let’s transform the way we design policies. Let’s make sure we have a clear mechanism through which we can listen here in the Parliament and for government to listen to the voices of First Nations people so we can get those good policy outcomes that we all want. We all want that.
GILBERT: Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister, Patrick Gorman. I appreciate your time. We’ll talk to you soon. Thanks.
GORMAN: Thank you.
