NTER Review
http://www.nterreview.gov.au/subs/nter_review_report/62_Ali_Curung.htmAli Curung
The Intervention
Most Ali Curung staff were pleased to hear about the intervention. It seemed to signal that the federal government was very keen to tailor approaches towards helping communities. The rhetoric was encouraging and the money was there. The announcement barely caused a ripple in a community used to the fluctuating winds of change.
Business Managers on generous salaries were appointed and Territory roads busied with road trains transporting refurbished demountables to house them. The community looked on with listless anticipation and we wondered how they would attack the training and employment issues.
The Business manager was followed by and equally well heeled Employment Broker in his signature Nissan Patrol with two spare wheels. He was said to be on incentive payments based on head counts. Ali Curung Council's compound became busy with government vehicles.
As time passed by changes of note did take place. The business manager gave the go ahead for a shed for the new art centre and he threw himself behind a move to have Outback Stores take over the Ali Curung store. The committee running the shop and a substantial part of the community did not want this to happen.
Outback Stores is owned by the IBA (Indigenous Business Australia-the federal government) and promised to revitalise the business. The store was suffering from lack of cash flow due to ‘book-up' and was badly stocked, often with poor quality products. Take-over by Outback Stores saw improvements in the quantity and quality of the stock as well as price increases to address the increase in overheads.
The profitability of their business is unknown but the government could not be too worried about this. The quarantining of welfare pavements was managed in such away that the Ali Curung store had a windfall cash flow. Apart from the price rises and the sidelining of the Mirnirri Aboriginal Corporation all seemed to be going well until it was realised the Warrabri Bakery was being put out of business, once more ,by insensitive management and poor planning.
The bakery had been in business and serving the community since the seventies (See Warrabri Bakery blog). The quarantining of payments meant that many people in the community could no longer spend their money with the business. In addition, a long standing agreement by the Ali Curung store on opening hours was also broken. Warrabri Bakery was going out of business. After weeks of appeals, radio interviews and some help from Warren Snowdon and Elliot McAdam, the bureaucracy stirred and the bakery now looks safe once again.
During this time the government employment broker thundered into the community. The task was to get people into jobs or more properly, to work. He plundered the CDEP list of around 160 registered workers. Some training programmes were started. These were simple repeats of all that had been done before and failed. A hand full of people turned up to work along side highly paid contractors doing community maintenance such as fencing and housing refurbishment. As per normal Ali Curung worker numbers ebbed and flowed and schedules crawled on. The business manager and the employment broker claimed accolades and barrow loads of money. Exaggerated stories of their achievements spread to people who could never be wiser. Employment remained as always. The programme achieved nothing that a properly resourced and supported Ali Curung Council could not have and at less cost. It was fairly clear that this part of the intervention was a very costly exercise that could just as easily been achieved if the bureaucrats had taken time to work more closely with the existing council. At the end of the day employment and training at Ali Curung remain unchanged. Also it is possible that an opportunity was lost to find out what small steps are needed to encourage engage the community in proper work.
The most obvious changes to the community come in the form of paint and fences. Homes that were painted as little as a year ago by a local painting team are now being repainted by outside contractors accompanied by their massive costs. Homes that were recently painted in colours chosen by their occupants are now repainted in standard colours. There has also been massive spending on fences and fencing contractors. The fences are welcome allowing some control over the hungry dogs and litter spread by careless children. However the work is slovenly. Poor construction will see many of the fences decay rapidly and a return to the status quo.
By now the business manger and employment broker are rarely seen in Ali Curung. Neither demonstrated much support for the community and its real needs. The Ali Curung school is in crisis, producing generations of young people who can barely read or write. 40 children in Ali Curung have never been to school. Of around 140 students there are days when only four will be in school. Adult education is ignored. There is no evidence that the intervention has had any impact. A government is pushing people into jobs. But most lack the ability to even read a tape measure or the number of litres in a tank, their skills are inadequate in the mainstream economy.
Such is the concern of a group of parents, it has been decided to form a committee to work out ways for them to manage the school and improve school attendance. The community now feel they can do a better job of management than the existing organisation and are meeting with key people from Darwin Alice Springs and Tennant Creek. No matter where the blame lies for poor school attendance and education standards, this group will be an indispensable element of future changes. In a community increasingly disaffected by the many changes over the last year or so this could be an opportunity for all parties to meaningfully engage with each other to achieve what is best for everybody.
Post Script.
FaHCIA and the IBA and Quarantining of Payments.
Using terms such as “I am the government so we do what we want” FaHCIA representatives attempted to bully business people into submission. The only defence available to business people badly effected by the quarantining of payments was to go to the media. Forty people from Elliot, Tennant Creek and Alice Springs met to defend themselves against an aggressive bureaucracy and bad planning. In most cases, with the help of ABC radio and people such as Elliot McAdam, they managed to get a better deal for themselves. Thanks to ABC radio, FaHCIA was found wanting in areas of truth and it is rumoured that a key player in the department has been moved on. There have been suggestions that FaHCIA and Outback Stores colluded to make sure any competition from other business be reduced so as to allow the IBA, the owners of Outback Stores maximum opportunity to increase their revenue.
In Ali Curung the strategy is clear. Outback Stores Business Development Manager is said to be ‘advising’ the Ali Curung store committee, the Mirnirri Corp, as to what they should do without any proper consultation process. Proper consultation processes in communities where English may be a second or third language is critical and takes time. Lack of proper consultation allows unscrupulous people or organisations to simply bully or bulldoze the people into doing what they want. Quite often, by the time the community understands the reality, then it is too late to stop the changes.
This has special meaning at Ali Curung. There are two shops. The Warrabri Bakery has been in business since around 1979 (see other blog) and has a good relationship with the Mirnirri Corporation now being managed by Outback Stores. While the bakery is recovering from almost being put out of business by the quarantining of payments, Outback Stores is pressing on with its agenda. The long-standing agreement with the Mirnirri Corp. for the Bakery to operate out side hours, including weekends, has been broken without consultation. In addition it seems that Outback Stores is now pressing the committee to extend the original one year management contract. Whatever the final decision is not important. What is important is the process used to reach the decision in a community increasingly alienated by the current era of change.
Vic Martin
Ali Curung Community NT
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