Formerly health administration and native policy were closely integrated. The principle was accepted that the functions of Health and Native Administration were fundamentally identical and the Chief Medical Officer was also the Chief Protector. Changes in the administrative establishment divorcing native administration from the Health Authority have deprived the latter of the opportunity either to advise upon proposed changes in native policy, or to study in advance their implications in health administration. Meanwhile changes in staff in both Departments have placed administration in the hands of officers ill equipped for their tasks because they are unfamiliar with the problems involved, in the methods formerly used for their solution and their inexperience of local problems do not appreciate the extent to which policy decisions and departmental routine in one Department vitally affect successful administration in the other. This lack of experience also prevents them readily appreciating and effectually meeting in good time the new problems created for them by changes in policy or method made by another Department without their prior knowledge or advice and which they may not at first suspect to carry any implication in their own field.
Employment of Natives
Formerly employment of native by any persons was legally permitted only under licence and the terms of employment were set out by agreement between the employer and the Chief Protector. The Chief Protector as the Health Authority was in this way able:-
- to prevent the exposure of a native employee to infection by an employer known to be suffering from a communicable disease;
- to prevent the employment of a native suffering from communicable disease in a situation likely to lead to him infecting others whether white or black;
- to retain natives employed in the white community under constant observation and review;
- to prescribe conditions of employment necessary or desirable to prevent the contraction of disease whether infective, nutritional or due to industrial hazards;
- to order conditions for accommodation and sanitation directed towards improving the native standard of living.
The conditions under which natives are employed today have been radically changed:-
- Although theoretically only licensed persons may employ natives, the formality of obtaining a licence is completed only exceptionally, and not as a rule. The Native Affairs Department pleads inadequacy of staff to defend this omission;
- Completion of agreement is no longer required. Natives are free to barter for their services, and to demand their own conditions. They do in fact hawk their services from house to house, sometimes remaining in employment only a few days. The native pays no regards whatever to the legal requirement that his employer hold a licence;
- Wages and other rewards for employment are not paid through the Native Affairs Department which therefore has no knowledge either of the parties to the arrangement or of its conditions;
- Employment for the Armed Services is arranged by mutual agreement between the Adjutant or other authorised officer of the Service concerned and the Superintendent of the Bathurst Island Mission. The Mission arranges for batches of employees to be transferred from Bathurst Island to the employing Service, the batch being changed at intervals of a few months. The engagement of an individual employee in such a batch is theoretically recorded with the Native Affairs Department, but officers of that Department were unable to show me that these records were meticulously kept, or even that they had at one time the remotest idea of the identity of the natives employed by any one Service, or of the duration of their employment.
Medical examination of the native entering employment, previously a matter of strict routine, readily imposed, is now impossible. Nor has the Health Authority any means of preventing the employment of a native by a person regarded as medically unfit to be an employer. Only in Service employment does pre-employment medical examination appear readily practicable; but even here it has not been carefully applied. Following a discovery that natives suffering from leprosy and tuberculosis in an infective form had been at times employed as domestics in Service households where there were young children, Commanding Officers of the Services agreed with the Deputy Director of Health that periodic medical examinations of these Natives should be made. It was arranged that these examinations should take place “as soon as practicable after engagement”, and not as a pre-employment precaution. This in itself is a condition largely defeating the purpose of the examination. At first, examinations were made by medical officers of the Northern Territory Medical Service, later as one or other Armed service acquired a medical officer of its own the work was delegated to him. With the inevitable changes of personnel there soon developed a situation where a Service no longer having its own medical officer and having a new Adjutant omitted to have the medical examinations undertaken. Meantime diversion of this duty from the Northern Territory Medical Service left new staff in the Health Authority without any knowledge that the examination was required to be made or that it might not be made. In the result infective natives have again been employed in the Services, a fact revealed not by an organised medical review, but quite fortuitously.
While I myself was in Darwin a leper discharged from Channel Island was accidentally encountered near the Administration Headquarters by a medical officer alighting from a motor vehicle. Interested enquiries as to his health and movements revealed that he was employed by the Army, although he had been discharged from Channel Island to Bathurst Island to review cases of his type. Notwithstanding the organisation theoretically designed to ensure effectual review, the fact that he had not been presented for examination was overlooked, no enquiry was made as to his condition or whereabouts and the Mission was not called upon to account for him.
The Department of Native Affairs report that from 180 to 200 natives employed in Darwin live at Bagot. About 300 work in Darwin, and those not in Bagot camp at the ten mile, at East Point, Shoal Bay or West Arm. They drift in and out of Darwin, possibly entering employment for a week or two and return to the bush. Natives in unsupervised camps, in uncontrolled employment or at large in the Town area constitute a distinct health risk. Leprosy, malaria, tuberculosis, hookworm and venereal disease controls are completely frustrated. Formerly this form of migration was prevented by strict application of the “prohibited area” clause of the Aboriginal Ordinance. Natives in the Darwin area were required to live under supervision within the native reserve except in a few cases where permits to reside on the premises of the employer were issued. In such cases special precautions and opportunities for supervision within the native reserve except in a few cases where permits to reside on the premises of the employer were issued. In such cases special precautions and opportunities for supervision were demanded. Officers of the native administration and the Police were active in enforcing this control which was applied strictly and with reasonable success. It now appears that a direction has been issued from the Department of Territories that Police are to exercise a greater discretion in enforcing the “prohibited area” clause of the Native Welfare Ordinance. Confronted with the situation that acting, as they suppose, on behalf of the Native Affairs Department in arresting migrant natives, they as a result find themselves challenged by that Department for exceeding their duty, it has become the policy of individual Police officers if not the acknowledged policy of the Police Branch, completely to ignore the presence of natives within the town area or within its vicinity, unless a police offence is committed. Removal of natives from unauthorised camps to Bagot reserve has therefore become the exclusive responsibility of the Native Affairs Department officers who admit that they cannot possibly cope with it. In the result, the Health Authority to-day is unable to:
- submit natives, other than those on Missions to regular medical inspection for the detection of communicable and other diseases
- avert the employment of infective natives in households where there are susceptibles including children
- protect the native from employment under conditions in which he is exposed to communicable or occupational disease
- keep under efficient surveillance, natives and persons of mixed blood who are known or suspected to be suffering from communicable disease requiring maintenance treatment or regular examination.
To correct this situation in the interests of the white or native population alike, it will be necessary to secure a much closer degree of co-operation between the Department of Welfare and the Northern Territory Medical Service not only in routine administration but in the framing of policy.
The recommendation frequently made by this Department on previous occasions is repeated, namely that a small interdepartmental committee be set up in Canberra to discuss all changes in government policy affecting native welfare and to inform the Ministers of both interested Departments – Health and Territories – on the broad implications of proposed advances as they affect each Department.