Tony Abbott set to accept Indigenous envoy role

Former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott. Photo / AP

Former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has reportedly given a conditional yes to taking on the job of Indigenous envoy.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who on Friday took over as leader from Malcolm Turnbull, did not ask Abbott to be a minister in his new Government, but asked him to take on the role of envoy, ABC reported.

Morrison said yesterday that purpose of the job was "getting Indigenous young people into school — what more important job could there be than that for those Indigenous young people?" Abbott had earlier said he needed to know the precise terms of what was being proposed.

"I don't just want a title without a role," Abbott told 2GB on Monday.

ABC reported that Labor's Assistant Indigenous Affairs spokesman Senator Pat Dodson has slammed the offer and Abbott's record when he was PM. Dodson said Abbott's Government cut A$500 million ($545.3m) from the Indigenous Affairs budget and had not been "overly empathetic", ABC reported.

Dodson told Radio National that last year's "Uluru statement from the Heart", which was produced by a gathering of 250 Indigenous leaders, called for a voice to be enshrined in the constitution. Senator Dodson said that statement was a call by Indigenous people to "have a voice where their views are put forward themselves rather than by some sort of intermediary whose record quite frankly is appalling".

Australia's next Prime Minister Scott Morrison, (right). Photo / AP

"The First Nations people have asked the Government for a voice and we get Tony Abbott," he told Radio National.

Morrison defended his decision to offer Abbott the job and said he had seen during his time with him in Indigenous communities how "passionate" he was. "I remember a number of visits I made with Tony to Central Australia on Indigenous issues many, many years ago when I was shadow housing minister," Morrison said. "We walked from town to town and we sat in the dust. There were no cameras around, we were just sitting in the town camps in Alice Springs. I have been up in Bamaga with him, I have been in the Torres Strait with him.

"I know how passionate Tony Abbott is about changing — generationally — the life circumstances for Indigenous Australians."

Indigenous Health Minister Ken Wyatt told Perth radio 6PR that he would wait before saying whether he agreed or disagreed with the offer.

"If Tony accepts that, then he's going to have to work with Aboriginal people, listen to them, accept their perspectives and then bring that back. What I liked about Malcolm [Turnbull] was that he kept reminding all of us that we have to work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to find the solutions, not do things to them.

"If Tony can do that, then that's fine. If he can't then I have a problem," Wyatt said.

As Prime Minister, Abbott spent a week in Indigenous communities with his ministers and senior bureaucrats each year.