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Keywords: Close The Gap

  • AUSTRALIA

    Building constitutional bridges: In conversation with Frank Brennan

    • David Halliday
    • 28 June 2024

    It's been eight months since the Voice referendum, and people are starting to grapple with what its defeat means for Australia. There are few voices in Australia as qualified to conduct a postmortem of the outcome of the Voice referendum campaign as Frank Brennan. We examine what lessons can be learned and crucually, whether there’s reason for hope for Indigenous constitutional recognition.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Sorry Days for reconciliation

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 30 May 2024

    This Reconciliation Week and Sorry Day, we consider the defeat of the Referendum and the substantial failure to close the gap between the living conditions of Indigenous Australians and other Australians. It means that for many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, this week will be less about days of celebration than of grief and of grim resolve to continue to seek justice.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Lessons from our failure to build a constitutional bridge in the 2023 Referendum

    • Frank Brennan
    • 27 May 2024

    Following the failure of the Voice referendum, many believed that the path to constitutional recognition is closed for Indigenous Australians. But they may be wrong. 

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  • EDUCATION

    Keys to closing the education gap

    • Anthony Dillon
    • 10 August 2023
    1 Comment

    We need to change the language from improving 'attendance' to improving 'engagement' — to reflect that schools need to be places of learning for Indigenous children, not just minding centres, and that learning comes with engagement. (From 2019)

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  • EDUCATION

    Keys to closing the education gap

    • Anthony Dillon
    • 16 August 2019
    10 Comments

    We need to change the language from improving 'attendance' to improving 'engagement' — to reflect that schools need to be places of learning for Indigenous children, not just minding centres, and that learning comes with engagement.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Edging closer to a just regime in the Timor Sea

    • Frank Brennan
    • 05 March 2018
    5 Comments

    On Tuesday the governments of Timor Leste and Australia will sign a maritime boundary treaty in New York in the presence of Antonio Guterres, the Secretary General of the United Nations. This day has been a long time coming. It will be a day of great celebration for the Timorese. They've taken a big gamble and it seems to have paid off.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Close the gap between public and private mental health care

    • Naomi Fryers
    • 10 February 2017
    10 Comments

    In my mid-20s, I sectioned under the Mental Health Act into the public inpatient system. The experience is so etched in my mind that it wasn't until recently, half a decade on, that I finally managed to shake the residual anxiety. A single admission to the public mental health system saw me crippled by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. By contrast, I've never had an inpatient admission to a private psychiatric hospital where I haven't been discharged in comparative good health.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Don't be disheartened by dismal Close the Gap reports

    • Myrna Tonkinson
    • 16 February 2016
    3 Comments

    Last week, Malcolm Turnbull presented the eighth annual Prime Minister's Report on the government's Close the Gap campaign. The Close the Gap Campaign steering committee also released its 2016 progress and priorities report. While the reports identify modest gains, overall the gaps remain wide the words 'target not met' recur throughout. The results are disheartening but should strengthen the resolve of all concerned to set realistic goals, with consultation at local levels.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    A train traveller's view of life on both sides of the track

    • Catherine Marshall
    • 12 February 2016
    3 Comments

    My little sisters and I stand at the window and stare out at the passing world. The youngest is not yet two, and though she will grow to be six feet tall one day, for now she must stand on tiptoes to take it all in. We see children running beside the train, laughing and waving. My mother throws them the sandwiches left over from yesterday's lunch. Railway lines take the path of least resistance and the routes of most gain, and so they bring us right up close to the people who live alongside them.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Closing the Gap won’t work without human reconciliation

    • Michael Mullins
    • 17 February 2014
    14 Comments

    The Prime Minister's Closing the Gap speech to Federal Parliament last Wednesday was a finely crafted piece of work that failed to hit the spot. It seems that 'Closing the Gap' is the Government's Indigenous policy. Yet it can be seen as a justification for getting out the big stick to achieve short term gains that will look good on the Government's own political report card. 

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Spies like us

    • Bill Calcutt
    • 25 November 2013
    6 Comments

    The recent observation by a close Asian ally that 'spying on friends is amoral' belies an apparently growing gap between the illusion of civility and honesty and the reality of our suspicious relations with 'foreigners'. While the justification for the development of ubiquitous electronic surveillance capabilities is counter-terrorism, the greatest beneficiaries may be private business interests gaining a competitive advantage in a global free market.

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  • ECONOMICS

    Gloomy forecast for Aboriginal super

    • David James
    • 12 December 2012
    6 Comments

    Superannuation is not generally available before the age of 55. For most of the population of Australia this is scarcely a problem, as they are likely to live well into their 80s. But the average life span of Aboriginal Australians is much lower. Many will not live long enough to derive financial advantage from their super.

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