FUSE 2021 - Recommendations
Click on each topic to read our recommendations.
First Nations Sovereignty
- Australian primary and high schools must implement curriculum about First Nations history that is holistic, truthful, and culturally appropriate.
- These programs must be designed and delivered by First Nations people.
- Change the date for Australia Day in recognition that the 26th of January commemorates the plight of the First Nations people, and a step towards reconciliation is to recognise it as such.
Climate Change
- Find practical ways for meaningful and purposeful engagement with First Nations people, utilising their environmental knowledge, conservation experience, and ways of caring for country. E.g. establishing an environmental integrity committee.
- Embed a concrete plan to ensure that First Nations voices play a fundamental role in all stages of the climate change decision-making process.
- Decision makers must be more attentive and receptive to the advice and warnings of climate scientists and be more proactive in designing climate change policies.
- Allocate additional resources to grassroots climate change programs for increased capacity and better delivery, as well as legitimising their efforts and allowing them to be strategically included in climate action at a national level.
- Create a climate change taskforce with the capacity to coordinate and oversee the provision of assistance to the people on the ground. This will help accelerate their work and expand their reach.
- Embed more rigid policies that address climate change at a systematic and institutional level and limit reliance on volunteer action from businesses and consumers.
- Commit to follow up meetings to create timelines for action plans proposed by youth-led groups.
- Implement a Federal First Nations Climate Change Advisory body to specifically inform climate change policies and provide culturally safe training, with recruitment done through a consultation and recommendation process with First Nations Elders.
- Provide support and pathways for First Nations young people to work in the renewable energy sector, including subsidised TAFE courses and designing culturally safe learning environments.
- Reform the Australian education system to include First Nations history and knowledge of cultural rules and regulations which involve respect for animals and the environment, and care for country.
Mental Health
- Culturally responsive training that is led and delivered by PoC must be mandatory in all workplaces but especially for mental health service providers.
- Mental health staff cohorts need to be more diverse and include those who are BIPOC, neuro-diverse, LGBTQIA+, disabled and/or have lived experienced of intergenerational trauma to contribute to a more conducive and responsive environment for sharing experiences, communicating needs, and healing.
- Individuals with these various intersections must lead the conversation, co-designing programs and informing best practice.
- Recognition that one size does not fit all. For instance, youth coming out of the justice system need targeted support to facilitate reconnections, to navigate their trauma and find pathways to become active citizens.
- Mental health services need to create safe spaces for young people be vulnerable and feel connected to one another.
- Services need more multicultural youth in positions of influence to advocate for themselves and more inclusive health professionals to provide culturally sensitive care and who can relate and empathise with the stories of young migrants and refugees.
- Culturally responsive practices should be at the heart of mental health care and should have a more personal dimension, with meaningful conversations free from judgement. In this way, cultural competency training can be purposeful and sincere as opposed from a task done to tick a box.
- Key mental health services should be brought to young people through existing structures such as schools. Providing support to young people within schools provides early intervention, mental health literacy and has the potential to improve mental health outcomes for youth in general.
- Youth mental health services need to be delivered in a sustained and holistic way, with expertise drawn from community and trusted elders to allow mental health issues to be dealt through cultural and community ties to promote deeper connections, raise awareness and destigmatise mental health struggles.
