APY Lands, Street Naming

The Hon. S.G. WADE (14:24): Thank you, Mr President. I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation a question in relation to the APY Lands Addressing Project.

Leave granted.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Perhaps it would help if you were listening.

The PRESIDENT: There was a bit of noise over here. Would you like to repeat your question, Mr Wade?

The Hon. S.G. WADE: I would be happy to, although I have not actually got to the question yet. It is about the APY Lands Addressing Project.

On 9 February 2016, the infrastructure minister announced a $272,000 APY lands addressing project in South Australia's Far North. The project, which involved allocating house block numbers and naming 143 roads across the 13 APY communities, was jointly developed and funded by the Department of State Development, the Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure, Housing SA and SA Water. According to the statement of the infrastructure minister, the project was undertaken in response to the fact that:

A lack of a nationally recognised addressing system had posed barriers to Aboriginal people accessing services such as registration and licensing…

Online forms for everyday use such as registration, banking and Centrelink access were out of reach.

I am advised that, prior to the project, APY residents had been able to access a range of services by providing the name of their community. APY communities are relatively small and residents generally know each other and where they live, as do the local policing and support services. The management of mail is centralised and letters are not distributed to each property using a numbered mailbox.

I am advised that, as part of the APY Lands Addressing Project, no physical road signs have been erected in communities, as the funding did not include this activity. In the event that an external service provider visits a community to make contact with an individual or household and has their house number and street name, they will be unable to locate the house in the absence of any road signs and therefore will be required to, as is currently done, stop and ask other community members or visit the community council office during its opening hours. My questions to the minister are:

1. Given the pressing issues in APY communities that require urgent attention and funding support, such as a high level of hearing loss amongst Anangu children and the challenge of providing them with adequate and timely treatment, does the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs consider that spending $272,000 to number houses and assign street names was the most pressing use of taxpayers' money on the land?

2. Can the minister indicate when physical street signs will be erected in the APY communities so that the alleged benefits of the addressing project can be realised?

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Minister for Employment, Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation, Minister for Manufacturing and Innovation, Minister for Automotive Transformation, Minister for Science and Information Economy) (14:26): I thank the honourable member for his question and his ongoing interest in these matters. In terms of the very specifics about the erection of street signs, I don't have specifics with me but I will take that on notice and take it to the Minister for Transport and bring back a reply.

In terms of the project of numbering streets, the honourable member is absolutely correct that, while there are not many communities where most people do not know where everyone lives, the biggest community of Ernabella-Pukatja is under 1,000 people (probably 600 or 700 people) but many of the communities are much smaller, with over 100 being a major community. There are about six major communities across the APY lands and then a lot of smaller communities and homelands.

I will double-check, but I think it is the case that it is not just having mail delivered to your house: it is also having an address to put on a form. Many government departments, both state and commonwealth, require a street address as part of a form—particularly online forms, which are often much easier to fill out if you are in very remote communities—and not having a street address can be a hindrance to getting efficient access to government services.

While I do take the honourable member's point about the ease of being able to find people, I am guessing that having street addresses will help, particularly with things like filling in forms. I don't think it is a case of by doing one thing you are necessarily detracting from everything else you do. I think the more we can provide services and deliver programs that everyone else around Australia has come to expect in our remote communities like the APY lands is a good thing.