(Transcript from SBS World News Radio)
An award-winning counselling service for Aboriginal substance abusers in South Australia has suddenly had its federal funding cut.
The program, called Makin' Tracks, has been at the front line of tackling sniffing, alcohol and drug abuse for 14 years.
Karen Ashford reports that Makin' Tracks workers are worried the defunding will end an innovative anti-drug program that's believed to be one of a kind nationally.
(Click on the audio tab above to hear the full report)
Jimmy Perry and Byron Wright have just returned from a week out bush running a counselling camp for men with drug problems.
With a master's degree and graduate diploma between them, they're arguably the most qualified Aboriginal counsellors in the state.
But this might have been their last trip, as they've just been told they no longer have jobs.
The federal government has abruptly cut their $300,000 a year funding.
Jimmy Perry says it leaves communities high and dry, despite bookings for their services stretching into next year.
"We support remote communities around their drug and alcohol issues. We do a lot of support for workers - there's not many workers out there, or trained workers, so we'll support them, and we also run a lot of diversionary camps, so while the kids, if they're idle in the community they might get into trouble, so what we'll do is go out, run a camp, we might do some traditional cooking, and some hunting. At night time we sit around the fireplace and we'll talk about education - we've got a generator and a data project we'll set up in the middle of the bush and we'll throw a DVD on about drug and alcohol and then we sit around the campfire and workshop it."
Fellow counsellor Byron Wright says the pair have worked all across South Australia, from the Pitjantjatjara lands in the north, to the Ngarrindjeri lands in the south, and everywhere in between.
Sporting tracksuits and dreadlocked hair, the duo's down to earth style has seen them invited to communities in other states and territories.
Mr Wright says while the bush is their speciality, demand has been growing in the city too.
"These young men out there had no one to assist them. Makin' tracks not only engages with the rural and remote communities, but we also engage in Adelaide communities - Adelaide's men's groups, Adelaide's youth groups, Schools. Just recently we've been engaged, over a year I guess with DECS government department, DECS, with the youth that are incarcerated for want of a better word, who are in care at this time."
In an average year Jimmy Perry and Byron Wright provide direct counselling services to 3,500 people.
Their approach starts with prevention and extends to support for those trying to kick addictions and stay clean.
Jimmy Perry's worried what will happen if their expertise is lost to communities struggling with marijuana, sniffing, crystal methamphetamine and alcohol.
"The results that we get are that we're asked to come back again and again - we know if we weren't doing a good job or if people didn't think the service was any good we wouldn't've been asked to come back over the last 14 years we'll go out, we've supported these communities in ways where we go back once a month and do some work with them, so it's not a fly in fly out service."
The contract for the Makin' Tracks program was moved from the Prime Minister's Department to Health on the first of July.
About a week later, The Director of the Aboriginal Drug and Alcohol Council Scott Wilson got a phone call telling him the program had been scrapped.
"They told me that the minister has said that Makin' Tracks wasn't a priority so therefore they weren't providing any more funding basically as of the 30th of June. So I sort of asked whether they could give me more information - nup, there was no more information, it just wasn't a priority and that was it."
A spokesman for Health Minister Peter Dutton said substance abuse is the responsibility of assistant minister Fiona Nash.
But her office says funding decisions rest with Mr Dutton.
Neither office has been able to clarify why Makin' Tracks has been axed, or what has happened to the funding, meaning it's unclear whether the money has been redirected to another service or is part of the government's budget savings.
Mr Wilson intends plead for emergency funding so that Makin' Tracks can honour its bookings in coming months with a view to submitting a fresh tender in the next round of government contracts at the end of the year .
"Our option is either try and get the Minister - and we're not 100 percent sure which Minister is it, although DOHA (Department of Health and Ageing) did tell me it was Peter Dutton, to try and see whether they can relook at that decision and continue the funding and at least take us to the period where, with every other NGO treatment grant program which they'll have to tender out at the end of this year, that we can put in a tender for the next three years. If we're successful fine, if we're not well at least we gave it an opportunity. But it's also about being able to go back to all the different communities that the fellows have worked with and least letting them know that the program is finished and we need to wind down their involvement."
Byron Wright thinks the program is a victim of a short sighted bureaucracy, that will ultimately cost much more than is saved.
"Is it institutionalised racism just raising its ugly head once again through this government? And what a waste. What a waste it is, for like I say, uneducated decisions being made by people who are unaware of what really goes on."
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