APY Lands Visit

Many Aboriginal communities around Australia are facing problems; with Alcohol, domestic violence, illegal drugs, unemployment and job opportunities, poor housing, poor education, housing, and poor living conditions. From March 1st to March 5th 2009, one of our students joined the Community Affairs Committee for the Senate.

 Many Aboriginal communities around Australia are facing problems; with Alcohol, domestic violence, illegal drugs, unemployment and job opportunities, poor housing, poor education, housing, and poor living conditions. From March 1st to March 5th 2009, I joined the Community Affairs Committee for the Senate.

The Committee was looking into petrol sniffing in aboriginal communities. We went to the APY lands, Anyang, Pitjantjatjara, Yankunytjatjara, three Aboriginal lands in South Australia which have been loosely associated for a long time. In the APY lands, it was planned for us to visit two aboriginal communities, Amata and Umuwa.

Amata is in South Australia about 100 km south of Yulara and has a population of about 270 people.

Umuwa is the regional administrative centre for the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Lands Umuwa is located approximately 460 km south west of Alice Springs. It has a population of approximately 50 people. Umuwa is serviced by a mail plane twice weekly and truck transport from Adelaide and Alice Springs weekly. Umuwa has no store..

On our agenda, Amata was first. We flew our way in from Yulara in Central Australia via two private planes. After a noisy 20 minute flight we arrived at a remote airstrip and were met by a group of large 4WDs to take us to Amata.

During the day we visited the Substance Misuse Facility (Rehab Centre), The Homemakers Centre, The Amata School, The PY Ku Rural Transaction Centre, Tale Arts Centre, the local food store and then my dad and I had the chance to speak to some aboriginal youth workers.

All the APY land settlements are ‘dry’ towns, meaning that no alcohol or drugs can be consumed in a certain radius of the towns. This is done because of the aftermath of the aboriginals consuming alcohol including domestic violence. This causes many problems because of the addiction. Many aboriginals drive outrageous kilometres to try to smuggle the alcohol back into their community. Most times they are caught, and sent by the court to serve voluntarily two weeks at the Substance Misuse Facility. The Facility also hosts people with petrol sniffing addiction.

The Australian Government has recognised this problem and all the petrol stations, bar three in the Northern Territory, have switched the unleaded fuel to opal unleaded fuel. Opal Unleaded is different to Normal Unleaded Fuel by that Opal is a bit more expensive because the plant in Western Australia has to add in some chemicals to take away the smell.

Aboriginals find this a quick way to make some money and to use a readily addable product as a drug, so they drive hundreds of kilometres to get the petrol and bring it back and sell it. The three petrol stations are now under scrutiny because they are making it a lot easier for aboriginals to get the petrol.

The Substance Misuse Facility was recently built to accommodate drug and alcohol addiction for the APY lands. The building has been built very exceptional; it has been built to accommodate the local aboriginal rituals and beliefs. Because it is allowed for families to visit their family members who are in the rehab centre, they have groups of more or less private facilities in the rough shape of an igloo where the whole family can come and sit, sleep and talk around a fire.

In the rehab rooms they are built with beds on the floor, no corners, no space for the aboriginals to harm themselves. A door than is always unlocked and can only be locked from the inside, so the aboriginals can feel safe during the night, and that they are free to go at any time. They also have outside the rooms a covered space where they can bring their mattress outside to sleep on. They have a room where they can hold local gatherings from discos to formal meetings.

Aboriginals at the moment are not looking after the children aged between 0-11 to satisfaction, many children are undernourished, and often left to look after themselves

This is were the Homemakers centre comes in, all the families with young children have to bring their child with its mum and/or dad for a certain number of hours per
week, were they learn how to do things most white Australians think of common sense.

The Homemakers centre also teaches them how to run a productive household. Firstly the children get a feed and then the parents learn how to cook for their family, they learn about hygiene, how to wash clothes, and just basic things.The story of the school is amazing. The Amata School has had its highest enrolment ever with 126 students and 80% turn-up rate, which is very high for an indigenous school. The school has primary classes, senior classes, and a Year 11 and 12 class, with 14 teaching staff. The Senior Students are only learning things that at are year 5 and 6 level, and this is because many of the students have got ear infections, which renders them almost deaf. The school deals this by putting speakers in each of the corners of each room and giving the teacher a microphone to wear, so no matter where the teacher is the students will always here the same tone of voice.

The School was amazed when five students this year came back after the initiation ceremony for becoming a man. Usually students do not bother coming back to school after this ceremony.

The School has some excellent facilities, they have added in smart boards into the all the classrooms, the have a whole classroom of computers, a library, and a pool along with the sport grounds.

The staff are dedicated to teaching the aboriginals at the school, so much so that the principal of the school decided not to hire a deputy principal, but to split that salary into a couple of aboriginal assistant teachers, to help the primary teachers teach the students who don’t know much English.

Almost the whole town of Amata is unemployed; centre link gives all types of different payments out for the aboriginals.
Tjala arts are providing jobs for a small group of aboriginals, who paint their paintings and then the paintings are shipped around the world. The artists get 60% of the price paid for the artwork and the other 40% goes towards the new art centre which is already being built.

The Youth Centre is a large shed in the middle of the town. Inside it has pool tables, a projector to watch DVDs on, Arcade games and outside it has a full size basketball court. The Youth Centre is a great place for the children to get out of trouble and socialize. The Centre also has room to host big casual gatherings.

The town of Amata has a motocross program for also helping the kids get out of trouble for a group of 15 boys and girls. The town has bought a group of 200cc motorbikes, and the group goes through regular training and occasionally they go to competitions. It is so popular that there are even some aboriginals buying their own motorbikes.
Unfortunately the trip to the other remote town, Umuwa was impossible because of heavy rain the night before. On our planes we went searching for an alternate airstrip an hour’s drive away from the town, but that airstrip was also bogged down.

Throughout the trip, I was learning about the remote aboriginal life, about their struggle with many problems and how they and the Australian Government are trying to make things better.