Little children are sacred.

Immediate action was required following the shocking revelations in the "Little Children are Sacred" report on Aboriginal child abuse. The Northern Territory Government was unwilling or unable to address the problem in a decisive way so the Federal Government was compelled to act.

Measures have now been taken to restrict the inflow of pornography and alcohol to the isolated aboriginal communities there, ascertain by medical tests which children have been abused, identify the culprits, bring them to justice, and ensure that the communities are adequately serviced and policed. All of which could have been done years ago had governments not been running so scared of the word "paternalism". The only criticism of these actions has come from the odd city-based group, for instance Aboriginal community radio in Melbourne and Sydney, which continues to trot out the same tired cliches about "the need to address the causes".

It is precisely the causes that are being addressed. Aboriginal leaders with credibility, such as Noel Pearson, have welcomed the government's action. They know at first hand the predictably disastrous results of throwing "sit down" money at Aboriginal societies: loss of self-esteem, demoralisation, alcoholism and an early death. The most successful Aboriginal societies in rural Australia are those in which elders enforce social order by banning alcohol and in which work is provided and encouraged.

Chief among those who should be held personally responsible for the disastrous state of the remote Northern Territory Aboriginal communities is the former South Australian premier Don Dunstan. It is a shame he did not live to see this day, because he paved the way to it. Bertrand Russell once lamented "the harm that good men do". He meant those men who transform their starry-eyed dreams of doing good into a reality that is made worse as a result. The saying fits Dunstan's lifting of alcohol bans in South Australia and the Northern Territory, except for one's serious doubt whether Dunstan was a "good man" at all. Another "good man" who did untold harm to the Aboriginal cause was H.C. "Nugget" Coombs, chairman of the Australian Council of Aboriginal Affairs (1968-76). It normally takes a long time for history to file its judgements, but in Coombs's case the judgement is already in.

--Philip Ayres

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

PHILIP AYRES has held professorial positions at Monash University, Boston University and Vassar College, and is the author of numerous articles and biographies, including Malcolm Fraser (1987), Douglas Mawson (1999), Owen Dixon (2003) and Prince of the Church: Patrick Francis Moran, 1830-1911 (released in July this year).