Australia and Norfolk Island flags. Photo: 123RF
One of the Pacific territories participating in this week's Pacific Islands Political Studies Association meeting in Wellington is Norfolk Island.
Groups such as the Norfolk Island People for Democracy have been at loggerheads with the Australian federal government since 2015, when Canberra assumed direct control over an island that had largely managed its own affairs since 1979.
The Norfolk Island population is built upon the Pitcairn Islanders who moved to the island in the 1850s, and they have ever since retained their sense of independence from the Australian mainland.
RNZ Pacific spoke with two representing representing Norfolk Island, Ric Robinson and Peter Christian-Bailey.
(The transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.)
Don Wiseman: Well, let's go back then. Ten years ago, Norfolk Island lost its semi-autonomous status because its economy was in the poo.
Ric Robinson: Well, yes, yes and no. We had assets there that were worth many more times than the 3.8 million that they say we needed to get out of the doldrums. It has been nothing but pressure ever since the 1979 Act came into being for making life awkward for the so called self-government of Norfolk Ireland.
DW: Because this whole idea of self-government just did not sit well in Canberra?
RR: Oh no. It was abhorrent to them. The only reason that the attorney-general at the time gave us this so called self-government was to stall the United Nations from looking at it. Even in 1995, the Commonwealth government directory for the department said, "enhance the Commonwealth sovereignty in the external territories". So, they have been plugging for a long while...
DW: Since Australia took far more direct control organisations like yours, your People for Democracy have flourished.
Peter Christian-Bailey: Rick and myself are here representing a group called the Norfolk Island People for Democracy, probably the largest group on the island. We have got 1300 registered supporters, and we believe we are aware that we probably have a very large mandate which represents the wishes of the people of Norfolk Island to our ultimate goal is to seek self determination.
We obviously are pushing in a few different forums in which we can achieve this. Obviously we have got two United Nations petitions burning away at the moment. One is through the Decolonisation Committee, and the other is through the Human Rights Council, which is a complaint in regards to our rights. Human rights have been have been taken away.
DW: Well, you have had these in front of the UN for some time. Progress hasn't been great.
PCB: As you know, the bureaucracy of the UN is a very slow moving machine, and at the UN level, it is obviously a very political playing field as well. So it is a lot of you scratch my back, we will scratch yours. It is a lot of getting the necessary political clout to move the wheels of the UN more quickly and in our favour.
DW: If, let's say Norfolk Island got this independence?
PCB: Well, I wouldn't technically say that it's independence we are seeking. So Norfolk Island, what we are in effect, our policy is, is we qre seeking a relationship called free association with Australia. That basically entails, we find what our areas of mutual interest are, and we act on them. And we negotiate from a place of equals, not from a place of subservience. So this free association is similar to the model that New Zealand has with Niue and the Cook Islands. And also you have other relationships similar to that, which are the Micronesian territories such as Palau.
DW: Why should you get this sort of status when there are other parts of Australia, for instance, all those islands in the Indian Ocean, that don't have that sort of status?
PCB: We would completely support what you are referring to are the Indian Ocean territories. They have a very similar status to us. Technically, we have got to be speaking from a place of truth. With the Australian government, they have got to recognise what our actual true legal status actually is, and what our rights are.
Norfolk was declared a distinct and separate settlement through Order in Council, through an act of the Imperial government back in 1855 and was created as a distinct and separate settlement. So what in effect the Crown, they have the right to change our administering terms, but not the right to change our constitutional status. So in effect, we wish to have our rights. And as you're referring to, the Cocos and Christmas islands have got the same constitutional status as us - being in external territory under the administration of Australia. We just would like to see our rights as more in line with our status.
DW: To what extent since the removal of the semi autonomy in 2015 have your rights been impinged?
RR: Ever since the 1913 Norfolk Island Act, we have had only laws that specifically applied, Commonwealth laws applied to us, that specifically applied to us. No other Commonwealth laws were to apply, unless negotiated with the various councils and legislatures right up until they kicked us out, basically.
If we had all Commonwealth laws applying to us like they have got to us now - they're applying all Commonwealth laws - it has taken away any semblance of separate and distinct situation. The Cocos/Keeling Islands, unfortunately, had a referendum on their status of dependency back in '74 I think it was, and they had 17 lines on the wonders of independence for Cocos Islands, 19 lines on independence with free association, and a page and a half on the wonders of integration with Australia. And 60 percent of the people at the time were illiterate, so naturally, they thought, 'oh, look at all the goods coming from Australia'.
DW: So that was material prepared by Canberra.
RR: Yes, they have now almost 100 percent unemployment up there too.
DW: Let's talk about Norfolk. What's happened? Norfolk was once, not that long ago, it was a thriving economy. What's the situation right now?
RR: We have got more empty shops. Ever since they brought in all their legislation about work. We had no one on our dole in 2015 now, apparently there are 150 people on the dole. It's that sort of thing where they've made it so hard for businesses to keep going that they just can't afford to keep it.
DW: Although, Peter you were saying your rental car business is doing famously.
PCB: There's obviously sectors of the community of the island that are doing well. But me, personally, I am not coming from this from an economic perspective. I am coming from this from a cultural perspective, and this is more the fact that we have a right to determine our own future.
As Rick was stating before, that in 2015 What actually happened was that we had all our democratic rights removed. Self-government was removed, and it was replaced with a regional council. So what that meant that a nything at a state level or a federal level was removed.
We basically run through a department, the Department of Infrastructure, which is an Australian Government Department. So we have no state level representation, and we have very minimal federal level representation. So what's actually happened? We have been lumped into the seat of Bean [suburban Canberra] for federal purposes, so we something like 1000 electors in an electorate of about 60,000 people.
So at a federal level, we have very minor representation, and at a state level, we have absolutely no say over the services that affect us, administered things such as health and education. A lot of people may say that a solution to that would be to completely integrate into Australia. We do not want that. We want to have our own autonomy, and we want to have our own rights restored. As we say, we are an ethnically and culturally distinct people we've got. We are from an Anglo Polynesian descent, and we consider ourselves Norfolk Islanders, first and foremost.
DW: All right, so there are these processes in front of the UN. What else? If we look at this process taking as long as it has so far, and it may well take a whole lot longer. What else have you got in mind if you want to achieve these things? Otherwise, nothing's going to change.
PCB: That's right. We have attempted to have internal dialogue with the Australian government. What's actually happened is that the Governance Committee has been set up, and they are looking at the terms of reference for this committee, which was actually called through from the Minister for Territories, who is responsible for Norfolk. So it was all about restoring democracy.
But the people have been taken completely out of the process, and the result of what has been delivered is another form of local government which actually doesn't rectify any of the democratic deficiencies that were present before. Unfortunately, it would appear that the Australian government is using this committee that they have established, and it actually involved electorate representations from the people of Norfolk Island, who do not support the outcomes of the inquiry, and they are basically using this process to thwart any progress with the United Nations. It's basically a case of saying, 'we've set up a committee, we've consulted with the people, and this is the outcome'.
It is absolute rubbish. It is just more nonsense coming from them. And at the end of the day, we would say, 'do the right thing, have us listed with the United Nations, and have a true act of self determination and do what the people actually, really and truly want'.
DW: So you're here in Wellington, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, to attend this Pacific Islands Political Studies conference. What do you hope to come from that?
RR: Well learning which way we can go, and associating with people who have been there, done that, and are still trying to do it. It should be very rewarding. The people who are far smarter than me are saying that with the new elections coming up in Australia, we will have a more open, honest, and transparent government. We are hoping for it, too.
DW: And the groups you're talking about who have been through this process or going through it as well. Who are we talking about?
RR: Cook Islands.
PCB: In terms of decolonisation, Tahiti and French Polynesia have actually got a presence here as well. Cook Islands, who actually have an arrangement similar to what we would like to aspire to. There's also a lot of academics and a lot of people who are very proficient in this very field. This whole conference is a case of not just us coming here and wanting them to help or give us some leads or some avenues, but it is also about sharing our experiences and see how we can actually help these other places too.
We can share our experiences and show our support. While some of our issues may be slightly different, I believe that we are coming from a much lower base than what a lot of these other places are. Most of these other places, attending, have actually got self governments and a reasonable level of democracy.
We are starting from quite a low baseline. But that doesn't mean to say that we can't support these other territories and countries in what they aspire to, and we would basically like to network with them and see if there's any opportunities that they can help us to achieve what we would like to achieve as well.
RR: Despite 36 years of so called self-government that were fairly successful. As you said, the federal government, when they sacked our legislature, they put in place an advisory council and the administrator chose the Advisory Council for about a year before we had council elections.
Elected council only lasted three years, and they were sacked. They called for new elections, and when they saw that there were so many anti-integration people standing, they called off the elections and put in an administrator. We are still under administration at this stage. They set up a local council type government for Norfolk Island that did not work, and now they are coming up with another local council that is not going to work either. It is just a waste of time.
