Posted by http://www.theage.com.au/daily/981021/news/news8.html on October 26, 1998 at 10:26:02:
Even the AMA have a problem with this:
From The Age
Wednesday 21
October 1998
Aboriginal health-care `barter'
condemned
By CHRIS RYAN and JANINE
MACDONALD
A deal in which an Aboriginal group swapped
its native title rights for a kidney machine and
alcohol rehabilitation centre has been branded a
national shame and a worrying precedent.
The Australian Medical Association
vice-president, Dr Sandra Hacker, condemned
the deal between the Jawoyn people, who own
the Katherine Gorge, and the Northern Territory
Government.
``It is clearly not proper to barter for health
care," she said. ``These are health provisions
that non-indigenous Australians consider ought to
be provided at their major city hospitals ... I
think it's an extraordinarily sad thing that
Aboriginal people feel this is the only option that
they've got."
Under the deal, which has been negotiated for
over a year, the Jawoyn people have surrendered
a claim and native title rights over horticultural
land in Katherine, 300 kilometres south of
Darwin.
In return, the Territory Government will provide
two renal dialysis machines and land for a
Commonwealth-funded alcohol rehabilitation
centre.
``If governments see this as a precedent, then pity
the nation," said the Federal Opposition's
Aboriginal affairs spokesman, Mr Daryl
Melham. ``This is not what the Native Title Act
was designed for. It is a bad precedent, it's one
that I don't want to see repeated."
But the director of the Jawoyn Association, Mr
Robert Lee, said the deal was an example of
how the native title process could benefit the
whole community.
Mr Lee said the sacrificed land contained no
sacred sites, ceremonial places or hunting areas,
and traditional elders were worried about their
people suffering from kidney disease and alcohol
problems.
Aboriginal people in the Top End experience
renal disease at about 50 times the national
average. For many years, Aboriginal people in
the Katherine region have been forced to leave
their traditional lands to seek dialysis treatment
in Darwin.
A former Jawoyn Association director and
Labor's NT Aboriginal affairs spokesman, Mr
John Ah Kit, commended the Jawoyn people's
initiative but said: ``It's unacceptable that rights
to land have had to be given up for services
other Australians would consider a basic right."
The AMA's NT branch executive director, Dr
Robyn Cahill, feared governments would now be
tempted to offer gifts to Aborigines whenever
they held native rights over land with a potential
to be developed.
The NT Health Minister, Mr Denis Burke, said
the AMA did not know what it was talking about
and he was simply responding to health needs.
The Jawoyn Association has contributed
$20,000 to the dialysis facilities.
Meanwhile, the Prime Minister, Mr John
Howard, has defended the record of the
Aboriginal Affairs Minister, Senator John
Herron, and has stood by his decision to
reappoint the minister.
A number of senior indigenous leaders have
called for the Senator to be removed from the
portfolio and questioned whether reconciliation
could ever be achieved under the Howard
Government.
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