Prime Minister Turnbull Reveals "Mixed Results" In 2016 'Closing The Gap' Report

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has updated Parliament on the progress of the ‘Closing the Gap’ campaign; an initiative to raise the life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

With a goal date of 2030, the ‘Closing the Gap’ campaign hopes to elevate the standard of not just life expectancy but child mortality, employment, early education, school attendance and Year 12 attainment among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

However, Prime Minister Turnbull admitted that the 2016 ‘Closing the Gap’ report displays “mixed results.”

The target to halve the gap in mortality rates for Indigenous children under five by 2018 is indeed on track, with Indigenous child deaths down 33 per cent since 1998. However, as ABC News points out, the decline in Indigenous child mortality has not significantly decreased since 2008 – when the ‘Closing the Gap’ campaign began - so it’s unknown what progress has been made in the recent past.

The only other instance in which the ‘Closing the Gap’ campaign remains on track involves Year 12 attainment, with the number of Indigenous students finishing year 12 in 2012-13 at 58.5 per cent (up from 45 per cent in 2008).

Unfortunately, the campaign’s primary goal to close the gap in life expectancy within a generation is not on track.

(On average, Indigenous Australians die 10 years earlier than non-Indigenous Australians.)

No progress has been made on halving the gap in employment outcomes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, with the Indigenous employment rate having falling by more than six per cent since 2008.

Efforts to improve reading, writing and numeracy among Indigenous children are producing positive results, but not enough to reach the goal of halving the gap by 2018.

Same goes for school attendance among Indigenous students.

In December of 2015, a new goal was set for early education, with Australia now aiming to have 95 per cent of all Indigenous four-year-olds enrolled by 2025.

This is an update from 2013’s aim – to ensure all Indigenous four-year-olds in remote communities had access to early education – which was not met.

“We cannot of course sugar-coat the enormity of the job that remains,” Prime Minister Turnbull said.

“When we close the gap we make ourselves more whole, more complete, more Australian.”