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A Brief History of AMSANT

Since 1994, AMSANT has played a major role in advocating for Aboriginal people’s right to control their own health services and to have those services funded securely and adequately.

During the 1970s and 1980s, there were strong links between Territory members of NAIHO (the National Aboriginal and Islander Health Organisations, the fore-runner of today’s NACCHO), and several meetings were held in Central Australia of the region’s community controlled services.

The formal establishment of AMSANT in October 1994 put the struggle for Aboriginal health on a new level. Although based in the Northern Territory, we have had a strong influence on the national scene and have also represented the health concerns of Aboriginal people internationally.

What follows is a summary of some of the major events in AMSANT’s history:

  • Formation of AMSANT (October 1994)

  • Campaign for the transfer of Aboriginal Health Responsibility (February to May 1995)

  • AMSANT organised a delegation to Canberra in February 1995

  • Following AMSANT’s lobbying, proposals were accepted and announced in May 1995, with effect from 1 July 1995. The Office of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Services and the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Council were established to form the basis for Aboriginal primary health care administration across the country.

  • Establishment of the new system (July 1996 to April 1998)

  • NT Framework Agreement was finally signed by the Territory Health Minister in April 1998

  • United National Working Group on Indigenous Populations (Geneva, July/August 1996)

  • Resource Allocation Conference (Alice Springs, November 1996)

  • Aboriginal Health Worker Competencies (July 1997 onwards)

  • Ilpurla Health Summit (October 1998): From 25 to 28 October 1998 - The first time such a large group of Aboriginal community representatives had gathered specifically to look at health on their communities. The Summit analysed Aboriginal ill-health and its possible solutions and passed resolutions on the above issues as well as Statehood and the recent review of the Northern Territory Land Rights Act.

  • Banatjarl Health Summit (August 1999): From the 2 to 6 August 1999 - The Summit was a forum for Aboriginal people, organisations and communities to discuss their health concerns and examine ways of improving their own health.

  • Gulkula Health Summit (Sept 2000): From the 4 to 8 September 2000 - The Summit was a forum for Aboriginal people, organisations and communities to discuss their health concerns and examine ways of improving their own health. The Summit was organised around the idea of the ‘Family is Life", family relationships and the crisis facing children and young adults in today's Aboriginal families and communities. The Summit also set up and ran male and female clinics at Garma for festival participants.

  • Health Planning Structures (March 1998 to present): In 1995, when AMSANT began the campaign to improve the administrative arrangements for Aboriginal primary health care, the setting up of transparent and accountable planning structures was a key objective. With the signing of the NT Framework Agreement in April 1998, these structures finally came into being.

  • Aboriginal community access to Medicare Funds (1996 to present): Aboriginal people, especially in remote communities, do not have access to doctors and therefore to the large amounts of Medicare money. Commonwealth funding to community controlled health services does not cover this gap when compared to the greater burden of illness that Aboriginal people carry. Therefore, AMSANT has been campaigning for the Commonwealth Government to “cash out” Medicare funds for regions of Aboriginal people. This cashing-out proposal lead to the Aboriginal Coordinated Care Trials in the NT (1996-97) and the 1999 Budget announcement of the Primary Health Care Access Program (PHCAP).

  • Primary Health Care Access Program (1999 -2003): By 2001, AMSANT, working with the NTAHF planning partners, had secured PHCAP funding for five health zones in Central Australia and two zones currently proposed in the Top End.


AMSANT seeks to ensure the Commonwealth and DHCS will work towards implementing PHCAP through an established funding benchmark, achieved over time to address the poor health status of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people by:

  • Increasing the availability of primary health care services to Aboriginal people

  • Weighting the funding formula for increased morbidity and degree of remoteness:

  • Pooling Commonwealth and Territory Primary Health Care funding.

  • Reforming the NT health system to better meet the needs of Indigenous people;

  • Creating an environment that is empowering for individuals and communities to take greater responsibility for their own health by establishing Aboriginal controlled health boards and Aboriginal controlled community primary health care services.

 

Securing additional resources for Primary Health Care


(2001-2003): Through the NT Aboriginal Health Forum structure, AMSANT has played a key role in the roll-out of other interim financing options (such as RCI, RHS and regional planning funds) to target available funding against the health needs Aboriginal people prior to the full roll-out PHCAP and to implement these interim financing options in accordance with agreed regional plans and the PHCAP implementation framework e.g. the Top End West Consultancy, Southern Barkly zone and Santa Theresa Rural Health Service funding proposals and has participation in the Western Aranda health planning study.
(2003): AMSANT played a key role in achieving the allocation of major capital works funding from PHCAP slippage funds including $7M in the five Central Australian PHCAP zones.
(2003): AMSANT Submission to the Section 100 Review suggested ways Section 100 of The National Health Act 1953 can work better in remote areas and also advocated the allocation of a Safety Net number to all Aboriginal health services so that access to PBS medicines can be improved for all Aboriginal people throughout Australia.
(2003): Submission to the Review of the Medicare Provider Number Legislation. This Act passed in 1997 has been vitally important for our health services in the NT and we supported its retention with suggested ways to improve parts of the Act.
(2003): Submission to the Senate Inquiry into Medicare which asks the Commonwealth government to commit to taxation funded
universal health insurance.

For a more details version of AMSANT History, click here
 
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