Macklin defies Rudd on Indigenous affairs and goes back to the past

"Jenny Macklin has defied her Leader at Labor’s national conference today, promising a return to the past in Indigenous affairs," Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, Mal Brough, said today.

"In one of the first key policy debates after Mr Rudd promised Labor was a ‘party of the future,’ Jenny Macklin promised to take Labor straight back to a failed ALP policy of the past – a new ATSIC.

"ATSIC was a failed model of Indigenous representation – 80 per cent of eligible people didn’t even bother to vote in elections.

"ATSIC was a failed model of service delivery. It was a key cause of the rorting, inertia and compromise within Indigenous affairs.

• It cost millions to run.
• Large numbers of staff were on six figure salaries.
• Senior figures abused their position, taking taxpayer funded junkets around the world.
• It failed to tackle tough issues like family violence.

"And this is Labor’s answer for the future!

"How can reinstating a model with its inherent excesses that benefit a few while the majority languish be the way forward for first Australians?

"There is nothing new in Rudd’s ALP. It is the same Labor Party. It is the same failed Labor rhetoric and the same failed Labor ideas of the past.

"Even worse than not offering anything new, Labor wants to go back to a model that failed and that most Indigenous people were glad to be rid of."