Liddle calls for audits of commonwealth Indigenous grants

Opposition spokesperson on Indigenous ­affairs Kerrynne Liddle has joined Coalition calls for an audit of commonwealth-funded Indigenous service providers.

The Coalition has renewed calls for an audit of commonwealth-funded Indigenous service providers after Labor MP Marion Scrymgour urged Anthony Albanese to audit the Northern Territory government’s spending on Indigenous affairs.

Ms Scrymgour, Labor’s special envoy on remote communities, said on Friday it was time for the commonwealth to “show some leadership” in order to examine where generous federal grants to successive NT governments had been spent and why the outcomes were so poor.

On Sunday, opposition spokesperson on Indigenous ­affairs Kerrynne Liddle pointed to her own various attempts to scrutinise spending within the portfolio.

In August 2024, Senator Liddle asked colleagues to support an inquiry into Aboriginal land councils and corporations, including their consultations with communities, declarations of conflicts of interest and transparency in their decision making. That proposal failed when Labor, the Greens and independents Fatima Payman, David ­Pocock and Tammy Tyrrell voted against it.

“The Coalition has long called on the Labor government to investigate the spending of commonwealth money to ensure the most effective application for improving lives but each time we have asked for an inquiry Labor and the Greens have rejected it,” Senator Liddle told The Australian on Sunday.

“The Coalition will continue to push for an audit into commonwealth-funded Indigenous service providers and monitor the impact of the Better, Safer Future for Central Australia Plan. Every individual relying on these services, and every taxpayer dollar, matters,” she said.

“The Albanese government must explain why it has rejected persistent Coalition calls to improve outcomes and why it has failed to demand transparency from the services it funds.

“Labor seems to have forgotten that they have been in power in the Northern Territory for eight of the past nine years, and the Country Liberals are still in their first year of government.

“Labor is hiding from its own accountability.”

Senator Liddle’s multiple efforts to force an inquiry into government spending in Indigenous affairs have not singled out the NT government, although she has previously said government agencies and any organisation – Indigenous or non-Indigenous – must be accountable for the services they are paid to deliver to Aboriginal and Torres Strait ­Islander communities.

The NT’s consistently poor results in the Closing the Gap national agreement were among key reasons why the Albanese government announced it would contribute an additional $4bn for public housing in the NT in a partnership with the then Labor Fyles government.

Five months later, the Finocchiaro-led CLP won government with a mandate to crack down on crime and lower the age of criminal responsibility in an effort to intervene earlier in the lives of trouble youth.

The NT has a population of just over 260,000, about 30 per cent of whom are Indigenous, and receives the highest GST share of any jurisdiction in recognition of challenges such as the poor health of many of its residents. The NT generates little income and its debt climbed above $11bn last July.

Ms Scrymgour claimed last week that many more families in Central Australia should be on welfare management plans that effectively quarantine portions of their payments. She said the NT department responsible for child protection – Territory Families – was supposed to refer families to the commonwealth for welfare management orders called family responsibility agreements but the department had made “very few” referrals.

Ms Scrymgour said on Friday that Aboriginal organisations were required to submit to audits while the NT government was unaccountable for poor outcomes.

“The commonwealth needs to step up and say ‘we can’t continue to have a lot of the commonwealth’s money being thrown into the Northern Territory and not see the outcomes that we should be getting’,” Ms Scrymgour said.