Stars, Aussie tycoons launch Aboriginal jobs push

Asian Defense News: SYDNEY (AFP) - – Australia's Hollywood A-listers, prime minister and top tycoons were to launch a new campaign for Aboriginal jobs on Friday with a spectacular light show at Sydney's iconic Opera House.

Cate Blanchett and Russell Crowe will join Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Andrew Forrest, the country's richest man, whose "Generation One" campaign aims to find jobs for disadvantaged Aborigines at Australia's top corporations.

Stars, Aussie tycoons launch Aboriginal jobs push

They will be among more than 400 prominent personalities, including billionaire gaming magnate James Packer, who will project their handprints on to the harbourside building's famous "sails".

"It's not about more welfare, it's about giving people self-respect through jobs," Packer said. "People can make a real difference -- one person at a time, one job at a time, one life at a time."

Fortescue Metals Group founder Forrest, who grew up alongside Aboriginal children in the Outback Pilbara region, said the campaign aimed to bring disadvantage into the spotlight and involve the entire Australian community.

"We don't need more money. We need action. We need matching of training to jobs," he said.

"It's not about, 'oh look, rich people can do more, poor people should be getting off their backsides or governments should be out there'. It is about every single Australian knowing the disparity doesn't have to continue."

Forrest hopes to sign 25,000 Australians onto his cause during a two-month tour of the huge country, which has funding and backing from corporate heavyweights including media baron Kerry Stokes and transport tycoon Lindsay Fox.

Aborigines, Australia's original inhabitants with a culture stretching back many thousands of years, are believed to have numbered around one million at the time of white settlement.

They now number just 470,000 out of a population of 22 million, and suffer disproportionately high rates of disease, imprisonment and unemployment. Indigenous men die, on average, 11.5 years earlier than non-Aboriginal males.

Rudd delivered an historic apology in February 2008 for Aborigines' mistreatment since white settlement in 1788, but last month admitted progress to improve their lives had been "too slow".