Tony Abbott a 'disgrace', says Federal Opposition after comments that living in remote Indigenous communities was a 'lifestyle choice'

The Federal Opposition is demanding the Prime Minister apologise after he suggested it is a lifestyle choice to live in remote Indigenous communities.

Tony Abbott has backed the West Australian Government's plans to close nearly half of the state's 274 remote communities and said it was not unreasonable if the cost of providing services such as schools, outweighed the benefits.

"What we can't do is endlessly subsidise lifestyle choices if those lifestyle choices are not conducive to the kind of full participation in Australian society that everyone should have," he said.

The Commons: Young Stephen Harper meets Last Year’s Bob Rae

The Scene. Stephen Harper sat impassively as his former self was once again resurrected right in front of him.

“Mr. Speaker, referring to an earlier omnibus bill, the Prime Minister once said, and I quote, ‘I would argue that the subject matter of the bill is so diverse that a single vote on the content would put members in conflict with their own principles,’ ” Thomas Mulcair reported. “Yet the Prime Minister now asks his own MPs to blindly vote in favour of a budget without proper study. Where are the Prime Minister’s principles now? Where is the Prime Minister’s respect for the principles of his own members of Parliament?”

Australian Aboriginals call money-management policy racist

RAMINGINING, AUSTRALIA—Living in Australia’s Northern Territory, a vast stretch of sun-baked desert, swamps and tropical forests, a tough-as-nails truck is the only way to get around.

But with each 10-hour drive in his mud-splashed Toyota Land Cruiser to visit relatives, Albert Djiwada wonders whether the trip will be his last.

While the retired public-housing manager receives a monthly pension of $786, the Australian government demands Djiwada spend at least half of his stipend on food or clothing in a government-approved store. It leaves little leeway for discretionary purchases, such as parts for his decrepit truck, which wheezes and rattles each time he starts it up.

Djiwada faces the spending restrictions because he’s an Aboriginal and, therefore, his pension is subject to income management — a central tenet of the controversial legislation known as the “intervention policy,” brought in purportedly to improve the lives of indigenous Australians.