LIZ TREVASKIS, HOST: Now, I have been keeping you up to date with the situation in the remote Top End community of Yarralin over the last few weeks. The roadside impassable for many weeks. Small amounts of food were being flown in at huge expense to keep a small amount of food on the shelves. And as we were hearing from locals, people were turning to fishing, hunting to make sure that they had enough food to eat. Northern Territory Senator Malarndirri McCarthy, who is the Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians, has been out to Yarralin today and wanted to let us know how things are looking. Senator, good afternoon.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: Hello, Liz, and hello to all your listeners. Lovely to be on.
HOST: How are things out at Yarralin? We've been catching up regularly to hear from locals. What have you found out there today?
MCCARTHY: It was a good chance for locals to have a chat to me, Liz, and let me know just how they felt throughout the wet season. Many of them feeling completely isolated and abandoned in some circumstances and very relieved that the weather has changed and the roads are starting to open, even though it's quite difficult still for, you know, just ordinary vehicles to get through, but at least the trucks are able to get through in terms of food supplies. And it was just a chance to sort of reach out and just say, look, you know, we do care. I know that sounds really odd, but I certainly do. I've been travelling across the Territory to many of our communities just to say G'Day.
HOST: Have food supplies returned to normal out there?
MCCARTHY: Look, I did spend some time at the store with Scott and certainly the staff there to go through things at the shelves. They talked about how they should plan for the next wet. This was totally unexpected. And even when I was at the school, Liz, it was interesting just listening to the teachers with some of the impacts it's had on them, trying to get to and from the community in between, you know, the school break and just being able to access food themselves and the students. And so naturally, spending time with the school kids was important.
HOST: I certainly heard from teachers before, I think they were, a lot of them were away for the school holidays, as you do, if you have come from far away, you take that opportunity during the school holidays to maybe spend some time in Darwin or even pop over to Bali. I'm not sure where the teachers were, but they weren't in community. And it was unclear for a while if they would go back because they were like, well, we're not going to go back if there's not food in town.
MCCARTHY: That's right, Liz, absolutely. And they certainly shared that story with me, with the uncertainty of whether they could come back after the school break, you know, in terms of the fact of food and also water. Water was a big issue that kept coming up today, too, just for your listeners to know, even though that Yarralin is by some, you know, beautiful river systems, you know, to many of the residents there, the water, they have a problem with it. And clearly the store and the school and others who live there, needed to fly in water as well. And that adds to the kilos on the planes that they could get in the end.
HOST: It's been really hard for them
MCCARTHY: It was pretty tough
HOST: To get all the food in and given that it's just small planes that you can fly stuff in. The community reported as we were speaking to them that they really felt like they were left on their own to figure it out. Northern Territory government was flying food in for a little while, but as soon as the emergency declaration was lifted, they felt like they were left to figure it out on their own. You used the word isolated. Do you think the Northern Territory government did enough to help that community?
MCCARTHY: Well, I certainly think that we need to debrief as to what actually occurred and what we can do differently going into the next wet season. Clearly, the Northern Territory government had its priorities and at a federal level, we weren't called in, in terms of Yarralin to assist, but we did in terms of later on with some of the flights, but also with the school nutrition program to make sure they had food in the school.
HOST: Should you have gotten a call to help earlier?
MCCARTHY: Well, I think these are certainly important questions that we need to look at, Liz, and that's why my visit to Yarralin today was really important to get a sense from the residents themselves, as to how they felt. Did they feel supported? Did they feel enough was done and what can we do in the future? And I came away with the view that I’ll work, certainly with the Northern Territory government, to make sure that we do things differently going forward.
HOST: This situation is not unique to Yarralin. If there is another normal wet season or a bigger wet season next year and with climate change, these kind of rain events may increase. Communities get cut off, roads get damaged. We were talking last week about the price tag for bitumenising roads like it's a million dollars per kilometre, so we can't bitumenise the whole Territory road network. But this will just keep happening again. Can you give us a sense, that the Federal Government is sort of looking at long term plans to ensure food security in remote communities? Is this something where the biggest and the brightest minds are getting together to come up with some interesting solutions.
McCARTHY: Well, I can certainly say to you, Liz, and your listeners, that I'm looking at it. Food security is absolutely vital. We saw the road with the Stuart Highway cut off and the impact that it had on Katherine and Darwin and these communities, whether they're in Yarralin or in the east around Minyerri or Ngukurr or other places, they feel it ten times worse because they're completely isolated. But the other factor too, is that when communications go down, as they did in the case of Yarralin and Pigeon Hole and Timber Creek, that also impacts and greatens the sense of isolation.
HOST: So, you're looking at this, but are there more people with you looking at this for long term plans for a climate affected Northern Territory?
McCARTHY: Well, we do have, under Linda Burney, the Food Security Working Group Liz, and that is a roundtable with the stores in the region, but also wanting to work with the suppliers themselves. So, that's one element of it in terms of the cost of living and the cost of foods.
HOST: Have you heard about the Sherpa? Did Martin from the shop out there grab you and tell you about the sherp?
MCCARTHY: No.
HOST: Oh, you've got to learn it. You've got to learn about the sherp. So, the sherp is, it's this vehicle that the World Food Program uses in Africa. So, remote parts, flood affected parts where they use this vehicle to deliver food. When communities are cut off, the UN uses it. It's like an all-terrain vehicle and you can deflate the wheel so that they sort of turn into a boat so that they can cross flooded waterways without damaging the road, which has been the issue with getting some of the heavy vehicles through the damaged road and that damage just increasing. Martin wants to get one of these $300,000 they cost, but that's less than has been spent on flying food in. He told us that it's half a million that's been spent getting food in. Is that something that the Federal Government could look at? Like an innovative solution to a problem that's not going anywhere?
MCCARTHY: Well, he certainly. I certainly didn't have that raised with me today through Scott, Liz, but now that I've heard it from you, I think any innovation, any innovative ideas is always good to look at. And there's nothing to say we can't do that. I suppose the biggest thing here is really, and this is what I am working on, is infrastructure. Looking at our roads more long term and not just around Yarralin. Clearly there are roads across the Top End, we get isolated and cut off in many parts of northeast Arnhem Land. We've seen the issues with Timber Creek, so we do have to come together to have a better way forward in terms of resources and infrastructure.
HOST: And specifically, are there improvements to infrastructure that you are looking at right now that you can tell us about?
McCARTHY: Well, I'm certainly looking around the ports at the moment as part of the Food Security Working Group. I have asked for audits around all the coastline around the Northern Territory, but right across northern Australia, because we have issues with, if we can't get the barges into our communities, whether they're at Milingimbi or Ramo and around to Nhulunbuy, then we still have issues with getting food in by road or by sea. And in the end, it always ends up being by air.
HOST: Alright, well, if you're looking at ways and means of transporting the food - sherp. I'm going to send your people the information because it's really cool and it's like an innovative solution that, you know, maybe hasn't been considered yet. All right, Senator Malarndirri McCarthy. I've got to go. I'm so sorry. We're just heading up to the news headlines. Thank you for getting in touch to let us know about the visit out to Yarralin today. She's the Northern Territory Labor Senator and Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians.