Life on the West Island - You’re welcome

The age of enlightenment and reconciliation on the West Island is under attack. The election of egotistical liar and convicted felon Donald Trump as President of the United States has emboldened some of the cultural warriors in our nation to try to turn back the clock on much of the social progress made in the last forty years, including an attack on the widely practised traditional welcomes to country by Indigenous custodians of land stolen from Aboriginal peoples by British colonists, often accompanied by massacres and ethnic cleansing measures including poisoning meat or waterholes and deliberate spreading of European diseases.

A small step toward reconciling this savage past has become the acknowledgement of traditional ownership and occupation of lands over which sovereignty was never ceded, in the form of welcome to country ceremonies, sometimes accompanied by traditional smoking rituals.

Reconciliation Australia says that Welcome to Country ceremonies are a modern adaptation of an ancient practice, where traditional custodians would grant permission to members of another language group to visit their lands. When permission was granted, the hosts would welcome the visitors, offering safe passage and protection of their spiritual beings during the journey. Visitors had to respect the protocols and rules of the custodians while on their Country. Today, while these protocols have been adapted to contemporary circumstances, the essential elements remain - welcoming visitors and respect for Country.

But now the federal coalition is attempting to start a new cultural war over this widely accepted practice. Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has said, if the coalition wins the upcoming federal election, she will abolish funding for Welcome to Country ceremonies. Senator Price has recently been elevated to Shadow Minister for Government Efficiency, leapfrogging Shadow Assistant Minister for Government Waste Reduction James Stevens. She recently told ABC News that I don't believe that we should be spending $450,000 a term (three years) on Welcome to Country when that isn't actually improving the life of a marginalised Indigenous Australian.

In response, the government’s Indigenous Australians Minister Malarndirri McCarthy said the remarks showed the Coalition was focused on culture wars: It really is quite disappointing, actually - we know that the opposition leader walked out on the Apology, he won't stand in front of the Indigenous flags and now he doesn't want elders doing Welcome to Country. We have to really ask the question, where is the Indigenous plan for the future with the Coalition and with Senator Price?

When it comes to waste, there are many much larger federal expenditures each three years than $450,000. In fact, it is a mere fleabite in a budget totalling many billions of dollars. SBS News looked at government spending and found nine areas where much more might be saved. These included:

Royal visits

SBS noted that King Charles and Queen Camilla visited Australia last year for six days at a cost of $640,060.47 (excluding GST) to the Australian taxpayer. And while the monarch's visit to Australia was met with a range of reactions from First Nations people, many of his official engagements began with traditional owners Welcoming him to Country.

Imprisoning one child for 46 days

Last week, the Productivity Commission released its report on government services, which found Australia is spending more than $1 billion a year on locking up children, at an average of $3,320 per day. So, keeping just one child out of detention for six weeks every year for three years would save more than $450,000.

Business lunch tax breaks

In January Opposition Leader Peter Dutton announced that, if elected, a Coalition government would 'cut red tape' by introducing a capped tax deduction of up to $20,000 for business-related meals and entertainment expenses. Labor Treasurer Jim Chalmers says the scheme would cost from $1.6 billion to $10 billion per year and Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor claims it would 'only' be $250 million – a lot more than the $150,000 on Welcome to Country ceremonies.

Consultants

In May 2023, the Federal Government released an audit into the public service, which found in the last year of the Morrison government, 2021-2022, the cost of external labour across consultants, contractors and labour-hire contracts was $20.8 billion. As a point of comparison, in the 2024/25 Federal Budget, the entire National Indigenous Australians Agency was allocated $2.4 billion, which includes funding for investing in housing, education, health and justice - and a host of other programs. The cost of federal government work outsourced to just five consulting firms has fallen by $891 million to $1.5 billion since Labor took power in mid-2022.

Of course, all of the above pale into insignificance when the eye-watering spending and projected expenditures on really big items are considered. These include submarines (at least $370 billion); nuclear power plants (at least $330 billion on the coalition’s dodgy and optimistic costings); storage and disposal of nuclear waste over hundreds of years (cost in the trillions but not yet in the budget); and subsidies to fossil fuel companies ($14.5 billion last year).

Cutting such costly items by less than 0.1% would save an awful lot more for West Island citizens than the coalition’s plan to abandon recognition of Indigenous dispossession through welcomes to country. Perhaps this could be discussed at a long and boozy tax deductible “business lunch?”