Reportback from Kalkaringi and Dagaragu trip

Hi all, below is a report on the situation in Kalkaringi and Dagaragu.

Following a recent visit in the lead up to the October 20th protest the community is organising against the Intervention, and to highlight the impacts of the closure of CDEP on Gurindji residents. I also caught up with some of the CDEP workers on the BasicsCard that toured on Darwin construction worksites and spoke with NT Unions reps with us a few months back. Also attached is a quite comprehensive interview I did with John Leemans about the history of CDEP in the community and the impacts of the intervention and the Shire takeover.

Since that time not much has changed for Peter Inverway (PI) and the crew of about 10 construction workers who were previously under the 12 week ITEC contract (later extended by more than 6 weeks) refurbishing an old power station into a working community art centre. These workers were being paid on the Basics Card alongside promises that would earn a White Card (construction safety induction card which can be earned in a classroom setting in only a few hours anywhere else) and which they are still waiting to receive.

Since IRAG's last visit to Kalkaringi Macklin's department issued a response to the claims we made that people were working nearly fulltime without wages - by saying they identified only 8 people in the community working for the BasicsCard and that if such a 'training' program such as ITECs continued where people were working over the requisite 16 hours a week they would be discontinued. This hasn't happened, instead ITEC boasted in an article to the Katherine Times on the success of the program and have since extended it by bringing another 14 workers onto the 'construction traineeship' under the same conditions, though I'm aware of only another 5 participating in the project at the moment and receiving only a quarantined Centrelink payment and BasicsCard.

PI's construction crew now have projects directed by the Shire and ITEC which could easily last into next year (currently they're working 8 til 4pm fencing the air strip five days a week) and after that will be reconstructing the community oval and upgrading the cemetery. About half of that crew are still working for the BasicsCard.

I also met two carpenter 'trainees', Nathan and Asmon, working for the BasicsCard recently put on by the Shire, one of which has several years experience doing carpentry work for the old community council through CDEP.

Their boss is a whitefella named Gavin recently employed in the only fully waged carpentry position available with the Shire, though he is strongly against the work for the BasicsCard arrangement. Nathan and Asmon are both working on average 38 hour weeks. Nathan gets $160 week on the BasicsCard and $140 cash, with $25 left in his 'kitty' after rent of $60. This does not even leave enough to buy lunch while at work, and some sympathetic workers with the Shire have organised under the table 'smoko vouchers' for workers on Centrelink money.

John Leemans is the main organiser for the October 20th protest and knows the history of CDEP at Kalkaringi and Dagaragu well, having worked in the program for nearly five years as a brickmaker in the local workshop He now works for the shire as a CDEP and works coordinator and mentor. He wants to make the central focus of the community protest the issue of job losses and loss of services through the abolition of CDEP, particularly in Dagaragu where the impacts have been devastating.

Closure of CDEP in Dagaragu

John took us on a tour of Dagaragu to show what the community had lost over the last three years with support being pulled for CDEP programs. CDEP has been operating on Dagaragu and Kalkaringi since 1988. Until three years ago the community council/shire had between 250 and 300 workers on their books, from a population of around 800 A CDEP office coordinated the day to day running of the programs and worked with a CDEP kitchen to prepare meals for workers throughout the day. CDEP covered just about all the basic functioning services in the community which included housing and infrastructure maintenance and construction, a parks and gardens crew, rubbish collection, water services etc etc. Through CDEP the community built and ran a bakery which also supplied nearby towns and properties, a brick making factory for all local infrastructure and housing construction, a health clinic and old age centre and carer's facility and many more successful programs. Bar the bakery which is just holding up a couple of days a week, not one of these is running now. The elderly are now forced to live in carer's facilities at Katherine 500ks away, and incidents of trachoma have increased since the parks and gardens mob have stopped and the oval the kids play in is nothing but dust.

Incredibly, when the Shire took over the communities of Kalkaringi and Dagaragu went without rubbish collection for over two years while the truck was locked up, forcing residents to create a makeshift tip on the edge of town - it has only just restarted recently. Sadly many of the buildings constructed through CDEP are completely run down now, and the Shire continues to let hundreds of wild donkeys roam the streets of Dagaragu and use the empty buildings as shelter (!).

When the VicDaly Shire first came into operation they promised the community alot more funding, 'more than CDEP', for community building projects and proper jobs, but since then residents have experienced dramatic cutbacks in service levels in all areas. For instance, the carpentry workers were explaining that now in order to have a routine housing maintenance request filled a resident has to lodge a request with the Shire, this is faxed to Katherine and then must be approved by Territory Housing including filling out a survey of how the item was damaged, then if permission is granted to repair the item this goes back to the Shire then on to the carpentry workers to repair. This process takes on average a month or more even for immediate problems with water or locks. Previously a resident would walk in and notify the community council office and it would be fixed within a week.

John Leemans has estimated there are up to 150 names on the wait list for work with the Shire. There are now only about 20 fulltime positions with the Shire, and more often than not they go to somebody from outside the community. John also estimates there to be around 15 people working fulltime for the BasicsCard and another 10-15 still on CDEP. Many people have already left town looking for work in Katherine and Darwin. AJ, who works as a family support worker and domestic violence educator with Centacare claims Centrelink are actively encouraging people to leave and look for work elsewhere.

Before we left we screened the film Our Generation in the main park to a fiery response with many people keen to come down to Alice Springs following the community protest to take part in the NDA. We got the Jobs with Justice statement passed around to local workers who are very keen to see the statement published.

Union Support

Peter Herman the LHMU organiser for the top end region including Kalkaringi visited the communities last week to catch up with PI's construction crew and others working for the BasicsCard who joined the union during when Paddy, Richard Downs and Miguel Occiones from the LHMU visited last time. They held a meeting at Top Springs with around 40 members and non-members and pledged support for the community protest around the campaign for local jobs, including sending union delegates down on October 20th to help out.

While we were there ABC Darwin said they'd be sending a crew to cover the protest and since then John has been talking to alot of media, and some Darwin-based church groups with encouraging responses. Rosie Kunoth-Monks from Utopia is organising to go up on the day and bring a mob to lend their support. John, AJ and PI will be coming down to Alice Springs to take part in the NDA on October 29 and we're still trying to organise a vehicle for a group of strong women to come down as well.