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McCarthy threatens pulling funding levers on states on Close the Gap outcomes

Malarndirri McCarthy says there are funding levers the government could pull to put more pressure on the states to improve on Closing the Gap outcomes.

We have levers that we can pull and I know that through the Northern Territory Remote Area Investment, the NTRA, that is certainly an agreement between the commonwealth and the Northern Territory where I have pushed for those levers to be looked at.

So we are halfway through that and we see this expiring in 2031. So we have another five years to really get to the end of this and hopefully close that gap. And that is our aim.

There are certainly many, many moments of frustration. There is no doubt about that. Not just with the Northern Territory, there are other jurisdictions that we continually need to work with.

But the NT specifically, I’ve reached out directly to the chief minister, I have raised directly the concerns around the incarceration rates, but also the deaths in custody that we’ve had in the last 12 months, really, in the NT in particular.

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Source: www.theguardian.com

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