The Close the Gap Campaign is a campaign in it’s third year and is aimed at reducing the 11 year gap in life expectancy between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders and non Indigenous Australians.

Campaign Summary

The Close the Gap Campaign is a three tiered campaign that includes: • Service delivery to close the gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders through medical services, community services, public health programs and school programs • Community leadership to strategise around the federal and COAG levels of the campaign • Community campaigning to influence policy makers and funding bodies to support the service delivers Key campaign coalition members include NACCHO, Oxfam and ANTaR National. There are over forty organizational partners involved in the campaign across the country. The federal government made a commitment to Closing the Gap in Decemer 2007. Since then the Campaign Steering Group, the Federal Government and the State Governments have set budgets and targets to be delivered State by State through the COAG process.

Our Role

ANTaR Qld has been involved in the Close the Gap Campaign at the community campaigning level, working in partnership with Oxfam and QAIHC to lobby the State government to make a commitment to closing the gap in Queensland. In order to succeed the Government must close the access gap to primary health care and close the gap in the social determinants of health including education, employment and housing. It must also deal with the over representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people within the justice system. Bipartisan Qld support for the Campaign was achieved at a signing of the Statement of Intent in April 2008. Qld was the first State to sign the Statement of Intent. ANTaR continues to support the campaign through: • Supporting the National Close the Gap Day - April • Organising the annual ANTaR Close the Gap Award - October • Distributing the Success Stories in Indigenous Health booklet • Producing Close the Gap campaign materials including stickers, petitions and factsheets

Your Role

Your power to support this campaign comes from your role as a voter, a donor and as a volunteer. As a voter you can do the following:

• Sign the Close the Gap petition
• Write to your local member telling them how important Closing the Gap is to you
• Visit you local member to ask them what they are doing to Close the Gap in you electorate

As a donor you can do the following:

• Become an ANTaR Qld member where you membership fee will go to supporting the campaign work of the organisation
• Become an ANTaR donor and donate specifically to the campaign
• Support other campaigning partners such as Oxfam, The Fred Hollows Association etc
• Donate to a health related Aboriginal or Torres Strait Island project eg one of the Award Winners

As a volunteer you can do the following:

• You can join the ANTaR Qld volunteer team for Close the Gap events such as the National Day of Action and the Annual Award function
• You can host an event on Closing the Gap at your school, workplace, university or home
• You can volunteer through Oxfam or the Indigenous Volunteers Program

More information about this campaign can be found on the following websites: www.closethegap.com.au www.oxfam.org.au/explore/indigenous-australia/close-the-gap www.fahcsia.gov.au/sa/indigenous/pubs/general/documents/closing_the_gap/... www.hreoc.gov.au/Social_Justice/health/statement_intent Contact the ANTaR Office for more information on 3844 9800