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A Northern Territory housing council that is battling to stop the Federal Government forcibly taking over its land leases maintains it has not mismanaged the Alice Springs town camps.

Tangentyere Council has been negotiating with the Commonwealth over the future of the camps for more than a year and last week the Government announced plans to compulsorily acquire the camps.

It says under the council’s housing control there are still places of dismal poverty.

Tangentyere executive director William Tilmouth says there is still room to negotiate before the deadline in July.

He has told ABC’s Stateline any agency in charge of the housing in the camps will encounter the same difficulties because of the unique problems that exist there.

“The rent that is collected off tenants pays off a lot of bills, insurance bills, excess water bills, also people helping old people with washing machines and fridges and those sort of things,” he said.

“There’s a lot of social issues in and around town camps.”

Mr Tilmouth says real improvements have been made in the Aboriginal communities over the time it has been in charge.

“When you look at the history of those town camps, not long ago they were just car bodies and humpies,” he said.

“They were vacant pieces of land and people lived in car bodies and humpies and tin sheds, one tap for 150 people, so I can’t say that they’re worse, I think they’re a big improvement on what they used to be.”

Mr Tilmouth says the real problem is a lack of short-term accommodation in Alice Springs.

He says Tangentyere has done the best it could under tough conditions.

“Tangentyere has tried its best over the years and it’s something that we’re forever working against the current in regards to population and population movement,” he said.

“Alice Springs has never catered for Indigenous populations in the short-term.”

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd admits it is going to be a challenge delivering his $100 million housing and infrastructure package for town camps in Alice Springs without the support of the local Aboriginal council.

The Commonwealth has threatened to compulsorily acquire 15 town camps if the Tangentyere Council is still refusing to lease the camps for 40 years to the Government by July.

The council has described the Government’s plan as a “land grab” but the Government says its actions are essential in the delivery and management of new infrastructure.

Speaking in Darwin today, Mr Rudd admitted it is not an ideal situation but he says he cannot sit back and watch the living conditions on the camps deteriorate further.

“We’ve got to take hard decisions and we believe we’ve taken the right decision there,” he said.

“The [Indigenous Affairs] Minister, Jenny Macklin, has spent a long time trying to negotiate with the council, [and it] didn’t work.

“So you can either just haul up the white flag and say, ‘Too hard, walk away’, or you can actually put your shoulder to the wheel and have a go.”

He says the Government is going to have a go, and intends to make a difference.

“And this will be tough in the implementation, I grant you, but the alternative is to do nothing,” he said.

However, the chief executive of Anglicare NT has condemned the Government’s takeover threat.

Coralee Nichols says the move is unacceptable, unnecessary and will only compound existing problems around homelessness.

“If a community based organisation is having a difficult time it’s not up to the Government to come in and take over.

“It’s up to the Government to work out how to better support these organisations.

“It’s up to the Government to provide a partnership role so that these organisations can actually be driven by the organisations they’re supporting.”

Meanwhile, Mr Rudd has rejected the Federal Opposition’s accusation the Government has gone “soft” on the federal intervention.

A Government discussion paper on the intervention proposed allowing people to apply to be exempt from welfare quarantining.

Mr Rudd says the Government is committed to using the intervention to improve Indigenous disadvantage.

“We are going to see it through because we are determined to have in place policies which materially close the gap in life expectancy and infant mortality and safety for Aboriginal communities, as well as improving the educational outcomes and the health outcomes for Aboriginal people.”

A Mount Isa Indigenous elder says living conditions for some indigenous families are appalling and the State Government should do more to help.

Indigenous Affairs Minister Desley Boyle will visit the city next month after recent media attention on Aboriginal poverty.

Kalkadoon elder Ron Page says school truancy must be reduced and housing upgraded, while support services and liquor restrictions are needed in disadvantaged parts of the city.

“One of the things we would suggest is that somebody be employed there,” he said.

“Caretakers, gardeners, something to keep things under control, to help keep the people up a bit and give them some support.

“It was sort of the forgotten place by government agencies and it’s a shame that something like that’s right in the heart of the city of Mount Isa.”

Mr Page says he doubts Ms Boyle can do anything to lift aboriginal living standards in the city.

He says Housing Minister Karen Struthers should have addressed the issue when she visited a fortnight ago.

“All houses come under Communities [department] now, all public housing, so Desley Boyle doesn’t have much to do with the houses,” he said.

“I suppose both ministers probably need to get their heads together and come up with a plan or something.

“She just can’t walk away and leave it as it is.

“It’s not good - the despair of the place.”

A remote central desert shire has warned the Federal Government’s plan to to scrap the Aboriginal work-for-the-dole system will force its residents to regional centres.

The Community Development Employment Projects (CDEP) scheme - introduced to help develop communities and encourage people to earn money by working - will be abolished at the end of next month.

The Shire of Ngaanyatjarraku says the scheme has helped improve the standard of living in the communities.

Shire president Damian McLean says once people are moved on to Centrelink, communities will fall apart.

“We’ve seen in the Northern Territory what’s happened to the community organisations there - what was described as Northern Territory Local Government reform [has] essentially disestablished all the community organisations,” he said.

“Those communities have very little left.”

Warburton elder Livingston West says the changes will confuse people in the community and he is concerned locals will be forced to shift to Kalgoorlie, Laverton or Leonora.

“They wouldn’t understand what’s going on and they wouldn’t know where to start,” he said.

“Their hope will be broken up. They’ll have nowhere to go and be hurt, and if they start drinking, they’ll get killed.”

The Northern Territory’s former housing minister, Elliot McAdam, says frustration is growing in Tennant Creek over the time it is taking the Government to build houses in the town.

The Strategic Indigenous Housing Infrastructure Program to build 750 homes in Indigenous communities was announced last year, but as yet not one house has been completed.

Mr McAdam, a resident of Tennant Creek, says he has been told work will start there soon.

“People should never be accepting of delays, but it is very important that we get it right,” he said.

“I prefer that we take a bit longer, and get it right, as opposed to 10 years down the track having zero employment opportunities. Let’s not be rushed,” he said.

The Territory Government says construction work on promised housing in Tennant Creek will start in the next few weeks.

Housing Minister Rob Knight says building is under way on the Tiwi Islands and Tennant Creek is next.

“There’s people being recruited. They’re actually building kitchen units now,” he said.

“The design work on all the power, water and sewerage in those formally town camps has been done.”

The Federal Government is pressing ahead with its bid for a seat on the UN Security Council, despite warnings it could be derailed by a row over Indigenous rights and the World Heritage proposal on Cape York.

Professor Ken Wiltshire says the UN bid will be doomed if the Federal and Queensland governments continue to stumble over their handling of Indigenous concerns about the proposed gazettal.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Environment Minister Peter Garrett are entering two very different political challenges which are linked by the common thread of human rights.

Mr Rudd, who has spent a significant period of his first term in office building his foreign policy credentials, is committed to bidding for a temporary seat on the UN Security Council.

Various estimates have put the cost of such a bid at between $40 and $60 million and the Government has already raised eyebrows by enlisting Governor-General Quentin Bryce to lobby African leaders for votes.

Professor Wiltshire, who spent six years as Australia’s representative on the executive board of the United Nations’ Educational and Scientific Organisation (UNESCO), says the Government does not know how difficult the bid will be.

And he says Mr Garrett’s recent decision to support the World Heritage plan has made the task almost impossible.

Last Friday Mr Garrett and his state counterparts agreed to put the peninsula forward for listing, but the move has angered some Indigenous groups who argue it will stop them entering the real economy.

The Government stands accused of putting environmental concerns before the very real social and economic problems among the Cape’s Indigenous population.

“The World Heritage process now requires full consultation, particularly with Indigenous people,” Professor Wiltshire told the ABC.

“If the Australian Government is seen not to have properly abided by the spirit and the letter of those arrangements, it means Australia could be seen as acting contrary to the spirit of UNESCO.

“These are the sorts of things that affect a country’s reputation and if you are going for a seat on the UN Security Council you have to show that you are totally committed to United Nations principles.”

Mr Garrett’s office was at pains to point out the heritage proposal was a first step in what could be up to a 10-year consultation process.

“The development of the tentative list is the first stage in what will be a long and detailed consultation over the coming decade, helping ensure that we submit World Heritage nominations that have the best chance of success,” a spokesperson said.

“The Rudd Government is committed to World Heritage and the safekeeping of the values of our region’s extraordinary World Heritage places and we have previously indicated our support for the listing of appropriate areas [of] Cape York in consultation with the Queensland Government, traditional owners and other stakeholders.”

But Professor Wiltshire, the inaugural chairman of the World Heritage Wet Tropics Authority, says the talk is not being backed up by action.

He says the UN is extremely unlikely to approve the listing of an area without proper consultation with the Indigenous population, and the Government needs to produce more than just symbolic gestures.

“To get a seat it’s not enough to go around lobbying the world and doing deals and all these sorts of things, you’ve got to show that total commitment to UN principles,” he said.

“There is a danger that this (World Heritage proposal) could be interpreted that Australia is not abiding by its true role as a member of the UN.”

Much is at stake.

The quality of life of thousands of Australia’s most vulnerable people relies on being able to properly engage in the economy of Cape York.

The health of a potentially fragile ecosystem relies on sensible and sustainable management.

But a UN Security Council seat and the prestige of a World Heritage listing could push those concerns to the side.

Mr Garrett’s office says the Government’s aim is to balance the competing desires of development and conservation.

“World Heritage listing can be a huge opportunity for economic development on the Cape”, a statement from Mr Garrett’s office said.

“Australia’s 17 World Heritage properties generate $12 billion annually and support over 120,000 jobs across the country.”

Professor Wiltshire sees the danger in stumbling blindly into an environmental, political and economic quagmire.

“If they haven’t properly consulted with the Indigenous people and taken account of their values and wishes and needs there’d be no prospect and the nomination would be stalled,” he said.

“The World Heritage proposal is doomed if Australia still tries to gun it through. Australia will have a very bad reputation on the international stage.

“I don’t think Australia has properly thought through what’s involved in this bid.”

The ABC sent a series of detailed questions to the Prime Minister’s office but a spokesperson would only say that the Government was committed to the Security Council bid.

The time is right for the Commonwealth to develop a compensation scheme for members of the Stolen Generations, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Tom Calma.

Mr Calma says the nation’s mood is light years away from the reluctance and denial of the past.

He says Australia has to act quickly so old and frail Stolen Generations members can be helped by compensation.

“It’s very easy for people to be dismissive of this whole issue until they can start to think about how it has affected our veterans, how it affects all of us in society,” Mr Calma said.

“If we really want to be a just and fair society we have to look at issues like redress, which includes both monetary compensation and support for those people who have been affected.”

The chairman of a central Australian stolen generations group said other Aboriginal issues have distracted the Government from ongoing problems.

Harold Furber from the Central Australian Stolen Generations and Families Aboriginal Corporation said the problems faced by members of the Stolen Generations have not eased since the Prime Minister’s apology last year.

He said the group will use Sorry Day today to consider new ways to get the Government to focus on the stolen generations.

“Governments ought to be looking at it and ought to work out that there are a heap of different issues relevant to Aboriginal people and Stolen Generation people,” he said.

“It’d be great if they could stop sort of throwing us all into one bucket all the time.”

Several residents of an Aboriginal town camp in Alice Springs say they would welcome a Federal Government take-over to improve their living conditions.

The Commonwealth says it will compulsorily acquire the camps next month if the organisation managing them, the Tangentyere Council, does not agree to the terms of a $100 million, 40-year lease deal.

The council has described the Government’s threat as a “land grab” but the Northern Territory Chief Minister, Paul Henderson, says town camp residents do not own the land and the Government has an obligation to ensure they are receiving adequate services.

The camps are home to as many as 3000 people.

Several residents of the Hidden Valley camp say they would welcome the take-over.

“Tangentyere is wrong,” said resident Queenie Stewart.

“They don’t help people here.

“I would like to see a change.”

Another resident, Mark Lockyer, says the Tangentyere Council should have accepted the deal so people’s lives can be improved.

“I think the last offer that Jenny Macklin offered Tangentyere - they should have taken it because it would have made a difference to people living in the town camps today.

“It would have made a difference to the overcrowding, probably the violence, the drinking and kids going to school.”

Meanwhile, Mr Henderson says a task force will be established to coordinate the take-over.

“There are plans that have been worked on and now we will be redoubling our effort.

“There will be a cross-government task force put together between the Australian Government, the Territory Government, probably involving Alice Springs Town Council as well.

“Lhere Artepe would also be at the table to actually move forward with a plan to improve these town camps.”

The President of the Tangentyere Council in Alice Springs says he is dismayed at Federal Government plans to compulsorily acquire town camps.

The Government announced it would take over the camps after a $100 million lease deal was rejected last week by the council.

The council has until July to respond to the announcement.

Its president, Walter Shaw, says town camp residents do not want to lose control of their housing.

“The Government set a precedent in terms of the compulsory land acquisition when [it] announced it on Sunday.

“It is effectively a Government takeover.

“It’s a land grab.”

He says the acquisition would disempower camp residents.

“Politically, this means that it is a total displacement to Aboriginal people having a voice and the struggle towards self-determination and moving towards a future in true partnership with the Government.”