17 September Newsletter Friends of Eaglemont Village
The Voice - will you vote according to your lived past, or vote for your descendants' future?
Many older people have developed an environmental awareness because of concerns about the state of the Earth their children and grandchildren will inherit.
Many older Australians are approaching The Voice referendum as a single vote to consolidate and to express their dissatisfaction with generations of failed policy, practices, behaviours around "aboriginal affairs".
If our collective approach to "aboriginal affairs" had been more understanding, more targetted, better managed, more inclusive, less racist since European settlement we would not be now bothering ourselves with a referendum.
A referendum just like the one that has got Britain in such a fine mess - economic, social & political - by having under 40% of their eligible voters support Brexit.
Many among us bemoan policy and administrative failings in all levels of government right across Australia on diverse matters - the economy, health, defence, law and order, immigration for instance.
What magic do you think applies in "aboriginal affairs" that, alone among all policy fields, elevates it to some erstwhile unattainable status of good, fair, efficient, equitable, effective government?
Is it right to place a higher obligation on First Nations people to play "perfect civics", to call on them to have answers to questions of representation, of communications, of consensus-finding that have eluded the rest of us?
Have we all successfully identified and resisted the stream of derogatory, demeaning diatribe about First Nations people and various migrant groups that permeated our media and "pub talk" through the 1900s?
Inevitably, on the day the referendum result is announced, we will need to reflect on the outcome, and ask "what now"?
Some of us approach this matter on the basis of many decades of experience of living.
Ask yourself some questions - "Have I ever had a one-on-one conversation with a First Nations person?", "Have I ever shaken the hand of a First Nation's person?", "Have I ever had a First Nation's person in my home?", "Have I ever played in a sports team with a First Nation's person?", "Have I ever offered a First Nation's person a job?"
Why is it that the polls say people under 35 years of age strongly support a Yes vote, why people over 65 years strongly support the No vote?
Perhaps the answers lie - at least partly - in the length of time we oldies have allowed ourselves to be fed an unceasing diet of derogatory information about First Nation's people.
We oldies who chose to give Aborigines the right to vote in 1967:
We oldies who lived through the 1900s issues like the Stolen Generation, Gough Whitlam at Wave Hill Station with Vincent Lingiari, Eddie Mabo campaigning for land rights, wages theft in WA & Queensland, Protectors of Aborigines, Aboriginal Reserves and more.
Then there is the long list of First Nations sporting, arts and cultural people we are on the cusp of denying, demoralising & offending.
If the young people of Australia - with many decades of living in an Australia of their choice ahead of them - are overwhelmingly supporting a Yes vote, maybe us oldies ought support them achieve the Australia they want to co-exist in.
Just look across the Tasman at how NZ has grappled with their First Nations peoples' rights.
Far from perfect, still contentious to many - but at least the cousins across the ditch have had the fortitude to face up to their reality of including First Nations people - conquered and controlled by force - in their society.
The racism, the health problems, the education deficit, the poverty, the incarceration rates, the ugly domestic violence, the hideous child abuse will not go away just because you vote No.
As former blue-blood, silver-tail Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull expressed it:
It's time to start doing things with First Nations people, rather than doing things to First Nation People.
Mothers & Babies
Our Eaglemont Mothers and Babies network meets on the 1st & 3rd Monday at 10:30 a.m. at the Eaglemont Dish.
Don't find yourself going back to work without having made some connection with other young parents in your neighbourhood.
Housing Issues Not Restricted to Banyule
Listening to some of our Banyule colleagues talk up the "housing crisis" and their preferred medium density/5 story dwellings for our suburbs you might conclude there is a particular Banyule problem crying out for an immediate Banyule solution.
So far from the case.
The problem we have of sufficient affordable housing is Australia-wide. There is ample built accommodation in Banyule, and developers champing at the bit to build more under existing planning & zoning rules.
Trouble is the private sector construction industry keeps producing too high quality, hence too pricey, dwellings!
The root cause of the problem is not "Nimby-ism" in the so-called leafy inner and middle suburbs, but the failure of the responsible party - the State Government - to deliver public housing on public land already held.
Projects already approved against existing planning and zoning rules.
Our local Banyule "worst case scenario" is the failure to build public housing in postcode 3081 despite having demolished public housing - and failed to carry through on renewal programs nearly a decade old!
Google "Bell-Bardia" and weep.
The ABC News brings us a country SA example to exemplify this - employed people in Port Lincoln living in a tent in a backyard while 40 empty public houses sit nearby.
These public houses have been vacant for a year awaiting renovations as the contractor claims inability to secure local construction labour.
Might well be the case too - so why did the relevant SA public housing body not understand that before vacating 40 available houses?
(ABC News 17 September)
"The problem is not limited to South Australia — in fact, some say the state has fared relatively well compared to other jurisdictions.
According to ASIC, 1,709 construction companies across the country entered administration between July 2022 and April 2023, up from 1,284 in the same period 12 months earlier.
And it isn't just company collapses that are causing headaches — parts of the country have also been beset by construction delays and contract terminations."
A Different Take on Gang Gangs
Your Collected & Giftwrapped Posts from the past week:
Member discussion