Video transcript
My name is Chris Sarra I'm the Director General of the Department of Seniors, Disability Services and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships.
[The importance of Queensland Government First Nations partnerships]
It's really important for all areas of the Queensland Government to be looking to partner with First Nations Queenslanders in whatever way is possible and we've done OK at this.
The reason it's important to keep doing it and to do it more is because the data is screaming out at us that we have to do better at this.
[Queensland Government Reconciliation Action Plan 2018-21]
The Queensland Government Reconciliation Action Plan contains many elements which I which I won't go into, but essentially, it's an explicit commitment to conduct a high expectations relationship and to set about trying to make things right in terms of the relationship between the government and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in communities.
[Local Thriving Communities]
Our Department drives on behalf of all of the Queensland Government, the Local Thriving Communities agenda and what that is, is not a program, but it's a systemic reform that's designed to enable authority to sit closer to community. It's about reaching out to embrace local leadership.
And invest authority in that local leadership so that we can make better decisions about how we do service delivery and how we do service design for our remote and discreet and indeed, all of our communities where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Queenslanders are living.
It's an effective reform and I'm confident that it will deliver, and in fact it's already delivered. You know, we saw in the COVID response where we had to reach out and embrace local Aboriginal leadership.
Local Torres Strait Islander leadership and what was a very tense time and a very tough time for a lot of people.
But it was senior levels of Queensland government engaging directly with very senior Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leadership so that they could be armed with the best and latest information in term of what was required for their communities and so that we could be armed with the very best information from a grassroots level and the outcome was that we had zero cases of COVID in any of our remote and discrete communities. That's a fantastic outcome for anywhere in the world, but it just shows what can be had when we take seriously the relationship. When we are committed to high expectations, relationship and where we reach out and we embrace the leadership of local, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
[Commitment to positive outcomes through the Queensland Indigenous Procurement Policy]
You know, through programs, like the QIP the Queensland Indigenous Procurement Policy. It's an explicit commitment to invest in indigenous businesses.
And we've seen the level of investment in Indigenous businesses increase over the last few years, and we're on track to see that target of 3% of addressable spend in Indigenous businesses. Now that's a good outcome because it's an explicit kind of demonstration from the Queensland Government. It's saying to Indigenous businesses hey, we believe in you, and we want to buy what you have to offer.
Further down the track It's good because it stimulates business, Indigenous businesses and it sees more Indigenous businesses who are more inclined to employ more Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people. And so, there are victories to be had at so many levels when we can have an explicit commitment to engage in this kind of way. It's also important because as First Nations, Queenslanders will bring a tremendous amount of talent to the rest of the community of Queensland, and so it doesn't make sense to let such an untapped resource go untapped.
You know, I get really excited when I see my nephews working around Bundaberg, doing backburning on various places, using traditional burning methods, so it gives them an opportunity to be connected to their sense of culture.
But it also contributes to the well-being of country, which is not just Aboriginal country. Now it's all of Queenslanders we shared this country and so it makes sense to embrace First Nations Queenslanders to play an important part in looking after country so that it's good for everybody.
[The benefit of the Queensland Government's investment towards First Nations partnerships.]
From July to December in 2020, we saw $172 million invested in 389 businesses. That's a fantastic outcome, and it sees our investment in addressable spend for Indigenous businesses rise from 1.9% up towards 2.4% of addressable spend, so that shows that we're trending in the right direction towards that target of 3% by 2022.
And along the way we see Indigenous businesses becoming wealthy through those processes. That's a good thing. We see those businesses employing and engaging.
More young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Queenslanders and we also see mainstream Queenslanders are getting confidence in Indigenous businesses and more willing to engage them and that's got to be a good thing as well.
In other areas we see explicit commitments to engage Indigenous businesses through processes that identify big projects as Indigenous, specific businesses, and so with that comes a commitment to identify opportunities to subcontract Indigenous businesses so that they can be a part of building these big projects and the infrastructure of Queensland.
[The future of our partnerships]
When I think about the future from here, I'd like to see us get stronger and stronger in terms of this explicit commit.
I like to think that we're understanding the value that First Nations Queenslanders bring to the Queensland Community and that we get excited about that and we tap into that more and more.
Longer term, I'd hope that there's probably no need for such explicit programs, because it's just part of what we do, you know?
Uhm, we reach out to the people who've been at the margins, and we've recognised that, you know they've got value to offer and contribute to what is a great Queensland, the greatest state in all of Australia.
