Young indigenous hit by cuts: NT body
Despite young indigenous people in the Northern Territory being most at risk, that sector seems to be facing the biggest cuts under the federal Indigenous Advancement Strategy, a peak body says.
Organisations began receiving word last week on whether their funding applications had been successful under the federal system, after the government announced a cut in the last budget of over half a billion dollars to indigenous affairs.
"The government saying no front line services will be affected, that's plainly wrong," said NT Labor opposition spokeswoman Natasha Fyles.
A $480,000 cut to Amity's volatile substance and alcohol and drug outreach service for town camps in the Darwin region represents a 20 per cent funding cut for that organisation, meaning four staff will go, including two indigenous staff members.
It also means those communities will have no one working with young people to stop them sniffing inhalants and limiting the wider social impact, said Wendy Morton, executive director of the NT Council of Social Services.
To its knowledge, nobody else had picked up that service, she told reporters on Monday.
"It's pretty frustrating and heartbreaking, particularly ... with organisations on the front line working with people who are at risk, and you know if those services aren't delivered we'll have more children in our (juvenile) detention centres, more people in our hospitals, less children going to school, less people in employment," she said.
"When government talks about things like closing the gap and then, alongside, cuts services to that group of people, it's really hard to understand why they'd make those decisions."
Amity has also been working with retailers, running 80 training sessions a year on how to minimise access to volatile substances by young people.
"Part of the effectiveness has been developing strong relationships within communities," CEO Bernie Dwyer told AAP.
"It takes time for relationships to develop; top-down all the time doesn't work."
He said without a regular presence in communities, there could be an increase in communities downplaying volatile substance abuse, and sniffing outbreaks that could spread around the community.
Ms Morton said stripping funding from social services was not a way to save.
"Hitting the most disadvantaged, the most vulnerable and the most in poverty is not the area in which they should be seeking to save the money," she said.
Comment has been sought from the NT government.
