The Department of Communities’ Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisation (ACCO) Strategy was launched on 3 August 2022 by Mike Rowe, Director General of the Department of Communities.
The ACCO Strategy responds to the need to improve the way that Communities commissions and delivers services to Aboriginal children, families and communities, while supporting the development of ACCOs to increase their capacity to deliver more culturally appropriate services across WA.
The ACCO Strategy acknowledges the pivotal role played by ACCOs in delivering culturally secure services to Aboriginal people across Western Australia. It recognises that when Aboriginal people provide place-based, locally led and culturally safe services to Aboriginal people, the outcomes are far better.
The ACCO Strategy was co-designed by a Project Working Group (PWG), comprising representatives from 11 ACCOs across Western Australia along with Department of Communities staff and representatives from the Department of Finance. The Co-Chair of the PWG, Joslyn Eades-Tass said at the launch, ‘It is our responsibility to ensure a genuine collaborative approach at all levels with a commitment that we are all working together to achieve better outcomes for Aboriginal children, families and communities in Western Australia.’
The ACCO Strategy is an enactment of the National Agreement on Closing the Gap, in particular Priority Reform Area Two, Building the Community Controlled Sector. Under this priority reform area, all governments commit to building strong Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community-controlled sectors and organisations in line with the strong sector elements. All governments also commit to increasing the proportion of services delivered by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations.
The vision for the ACCO Strategy is for Aboriginal children, families and communities to be empowered to choose their own futures from secure and sustained foundations provided by the ACCOs in the places they live and work.
The ACCO Strategy provides a framework for how Communities will work together with and support Western Australian ACCOs to achieve self determination to create safe and healthy families and communities. The ACCO Strategy is built around three core pillars:
- Cultural Safety and Governance: That all services for Aboriginal children, families and communities are grounded in Aboriginal knowledge and culture.
- Partnerships: Building genuine partnerships and engagement with ACCOs to deliver strong accountability and culturally responsive ways of working.
- Economic Opportunities: ACCOs are given economic and socio-economic opportunities to deliver services to their community.
The ACCO Strategy will work on a flexible and phased approach to deliver on actions, with Implementation Plan One being the first of three proposed plans. Future Implementation plans will ensure the ACCO Strategy remains responsive to new priorities and challenges faced as the ACCO sector is strengthened.
