How MAF flights help employment consultants reach Aboriginal people in homelands.
“I love my job,” says Lisa Dhurrkay. “I’ve been working for ALPA for four years.”
Lisa, a Yolngu woman, is an employment consultant and receptionist with the Arnhem Land Progress Aboriginal (ALPA) Corporation, Australia’s largest Aboriginal corporation, an organisation with numerous departments and a wide range of community services and business functions.
“The reason I go to the homeland trips is to see families and interact with all the Yolngu people and tell them about how important it is to attend your appointments through ALPA,” she said.
Lisa mainly works in the office in Nhulunbuy town, but flies from time to time with MAF for the ALPA-administered Community Development Program (CDP), a remote area employment scheme. Other employment consultants travel on MAF charter flights on a weekly schedule of visits to support participation in the CDP.
“In the CDP, people work in the nursery, in the kids’ programme for getting them back to school, in aged care and in the Dhimurru and Yirralka Ranger Groups,” said Lisa.
The CDP also runs projects in sectors as diverse as construction, landscaping and digital media to build local work skills and promote economic development.
MAF has been a really big help.
On a typical flight with MAF, a pair of employment consultants can meet CDP clients in three different homelands in the span of four hours. By car from Nhulunbuy, a similar trip could well be an overnight proposition, which would require significantly more resources from organisations such as ALPA.
In addition to the logistical support provided by MAF, Lisa values the connections between homelands enabled by regular flights.
“It’s efficient, plus it’s very close [flights connecting homelands] and everyone knows everyone. MAF has been a really big help,” she added.
