Federal Government's jobs summit must shine spotlight on Indigenous employment

Zak Kirkup Published August 26, 2022 at 2.29pm (AWST)

opinion

Next week the Federal Government will be hosting the Jobs and Skills Summit.

Led by the Prime Minister and his Treasurer, the intent of the summit is in its name as Canberra battles to keep unemployment low, whilst trying to expand the economy and help ailing industries by bringing in skilled migrants.

From airlines through to coffee shops, Australia is short staffed at the moment.

We simply can't find enough people and for the first time in a long while, it's an employee market - pretty much anyone who wants a gig, can get it.

I'm not here to begrudge the summit or talk it down.

I think it's important to address the national crisis as collaboratively as possible otherwise Australia will face constrained growth which will damage our economy long-term.

My concern however is that reading the 'seven focus areas' of the summit, there isn't a real focus on trying to address the Indigenous employment rate in our metropolitan areas.

The Albanese Government has foreshadowed that they're going to release a regional employment strategy for Indigenous employees, but there is nothing to look at First Nations people who are trying to get more skills or build a career in the capitals across the country.

Indigenous Australians are fifteen times more likely to be unemployed, and prior to the pandemic more than half of the Indigenous population didn't have a full time job.

That situation hasn't improved during this jobs boom we're experiencing across the country.

In truth, First Nations people have experienced a jobs and skills criss for decades, but we've never seen a summit dedicated to it.

I appreciate and recognise that the Albanese Government want to put together strategies to address unemployment for the most disadvantaged but in all reality when faced with such a structural, long-term problem, it deserves a dedicated focus in and of itself.

As an employer of over 40 Indigenous people, I am often asked how we've done it, "whats your secret" "aren't 'they' so much harder to keep in a job".

There is, to me, a real stigma attached to employing Aboriginal people, and even in this economic environment employers don't seem to be keen to bring on more Mob to fill the vacant roles.

There also isn't a secret recipe to how we - or many other companies - have achieved this.

The difference is that we're not trying to trojan horse Indigenous people into a company that has never had the presence of First Nations employee at any level.

Instead, we started off with the distinct goal of making sure that we designed a company that was built around the unique challenges which Aboriginal Western Australians face.

An Indigenous Jobs and Skills Summit, which is really what we need, could look at how these strategies in other companies have worked, and how together with Government policy settings we could help address this dire unemployment rate.

I hope that the upcoming Summit achieves the goals that we all need it to, but I hope beyond the Welcome to Country on the day, there'll be something tangible to give more Indigenous people a job, because if not, that'll be the pass or fail mark not just for me, but for a country which has so far failed to close this important part of the Gap.