Jim wrote:
> I've just got to read the transcript, Ms McDougall seems like
such a
> real
> person! Wow, and we put Ruddock up against her. Typical
failure of the
> "L"iberal patriarchy.
Yes, in The Age's version of this report, Ruddock was pointing to
the presence of the Aboriginal contingent in the room as proof of
Australia's "progress" on reconciliation. McDougall responded
something like "yes, but why aren't they standing with you, rather
than over there?" I cringe with embarrassment.
Sandy
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: Oh Dear, Our Colonial Cringe is Exposed...
> Date: Sat, 25 Mar 2000 10:27:35 +0800
> From: "Jim Duffield" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> http://www.smh.com.au/news/0003/25/pageone/pageone10.html
>
> PAGE ONE
>
> Sometimes it's not easy being grey
>
> Philip Ruddock's conscience had him in hot water this
> week
> when he attempted to defend the Government's record on
> race.
> Simon Mann in Geneva and Mike Seccombe report.
>
> The language of United Nations' deliberations, in
> myriad committee
> rooms and marbled corridors, can be excessively
> courteous. Almost
> suffocatingly so. Outsiders can sometimes miss the
> subtext.
>
> You might have expected Philip Ruddock, however, to
> understand
> the nuances. He is a very nuanced politician. His every
> word is
> chosen with care, every pronouncement carefully
> qualified so he gives
> nothing away. Where other politicians paint issues in
> black and white,
> with Ruddock it's always shades of grey. He's a grey
> man, a politician
> with a bureaucrat's abhorrence of confrontation and a
> lawyer's
> capacity for obfuscation. It has kept him out of
> trouble, and the
> limelight, for 27 years, and helped make him the
> longest serving
> member of the House of Representatives. But Ruddock's
> diplomacy
> let him down in Geneva this week.
>
> Routinely, members of the Committee on the Elimination
> of Racial
> Discrimination thanked the minister for his attendance,
> welcoming
> Australia's "frank and candid" reporting on injustices.
> But the
> welcomes were heavily qualified by a long list of
> concerns about race
> discrimination issues, particularly those affecting
> Aborigines such as
> native title, the "stolen generation" and the mandatory
> sentencing
> provisions of Western Australia and the Northern
> Territory.
>
> One Geneva-based human rights observer remarked: "I
> think the
> committee is resolved on this matter. It's one thing
> for Australia to
> come here and acknowledge that injustices exist. But
> the committee
> concerns itself with remedies. What concrete steps is
> Australia taking
> to eliminate those injustices?"
>
> It was clear towards the end of the 56th session of the
> Committee on
> the Elimination of Racial Discrimination that Mr
> Ruddock's attempts
> to placate the 18 international experts with
> blandishments did not
> convince anyone that the Government was doing anything
> of
> substance to address their various concerns.
>
> Some privately accused him of ducking the issues. And
> his delivery,
> at times, was thought patronising. A casual query from
> Mr Agha
> Shahi about why Australia's Pakistani community was
> absent from a
> breakdown of the multinational population got the reply
> that it was a
> "top 10" list. Then Ruddock added, to audible groans in
> the public
> gallery: "I know many [Pakistanis] well."
>
> "Some of his best friends are Aborigines, too,"
> grumbled one
> observer later.
>
> The irony is, Ruddock would have been sincere. He is
> vitally
> interested in immigration and multiculturalism, a
> mainstay of Amnesty
> International in the Parliament. In 1988 he crossed the
> floor to
> reaffirm that Australia's immigration policy would take
> no account of
> race. In doing so he defied John Howard, whose policy
> would have
> taken account of racial mix.
>
> BUT these days Ruddock often seems a liberal of the
> type once
> described by poet Robert Frost as "a man too
> broadminded to take
> his own side in a quarrel".
>
> In the quarrel over mandatory sentencing of juveniles,
> Ruddock's
> personal views accord with the UN committee's. He would
> see it
> abolished.
>
> But he is "broadminded" enough also to consider other
> factors:
> Cabinet solidarity, States' rights, the mood of the
> party room, the
> mood of the electorate.
>
> Defending something he doesn't believe in, he defended
> badly. He
> was clumsy with protocol. He referred to the expert
> committee
> members as if they were country delegates. They are
> not. He thanked
> the US human rights lawyer serving as rapporteur, Gay
> McDougall,
> for her summation of key, unresolved issues, noting she
> had been
> "well briefed". A UN source later said: "Experts aren't
> briefed. They
> digest massive amounts of information, draw on vast
> experience and
> draw their own conclusions."
>
> Ms McDougall, for example, was on the Independent
> Electoral
> Commission that organised South Africa's first
> democratic, non-racial
> elections in 1994, she has represented the US in human
> rights forums,
> and supervises more than 100 Washington-based lawyers
> in human
> rights litigation around the world.
>
> She took issue with Ruddock's claim that Australia's
> federalist system
> made it difficult for Canberra to intervene on
> mandatory sentencing.
>
> "The issue of States' rights has been a perpetual issue
> in my country,"
> she said, instanced by the Civil War and slavery.
>
> "I think I would have fought for that, too," said
> Ruddock.
>
> "Yes," said McDougall. "I would hope that you would
> have been on
> the same side as me."
>
> Mr Ruddock suggested there were complexities to the
> Australian
> situation the experts did not understand.
>
> A panel member suggested the committee could reach a
> better
> understanding by mediating in the issue, particularly
> if the
> Government agreed to reopen negotiations with
> Aboriginal leaders on
> native title.
>
> But the offer appeared to fall on deaf ears. Mr Ruddock
> gave no
> formal response.
>
> At the end of the day, Ruddock's presence seemed to
> have done
> nothing to help the Australian case, with Ms McDougal
> asking: "How
> is it that a highly developed, industrialised State
> such as Australia has
> been unable to bring this 2 per cent of its population
> up to a
> reasonable standard of living?"
>
> The experts appeared concerned by the Australian
> Government's
> refusal to budge on its 1998 native title amendments,
> its apparent
> hostility to a just settlement with the "stolen
> generation" and its
> inability to simply say "sorry". Nor could they fathom
> its inaction on
> mandatory sentencing, legislation they consider
> patently racially
> discriminatory.
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