Mal Brough (Longman, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

The normal thuggery, the normal loudmouth and the normal hollow rhetoric that comes out of your position. That is all that you ever do. Going back to Hopevale that the member for Kennedy mentioned, this is something that is not new to the rest of Australia, but it is spreading across the nation. It is people from Hopevale and people like Vince down there at Yarrabah, whom I spoke to only the other day, who have been waiting on the Queensland government for five years for the same thing that we are offering here to the Northern Territory. I say to the people of Hopevale and Aurukun and all of the cape communities: if I had my way and I could, I would legislate today in this place to give you the right to own your own homes as well. I would give you the opportunities so that your kids can see what it is like to have some leadership and what it is like to make your way in the world. But no, those that sit opposite, if given the chance to sit on this side of the chamber, would snuff that out for the people of the Northern Territory.

If this is something that people do not want to do, why is it that when I look into the eyes of the elders of the people of Galiwinku they say to me, ‘We know that this opportunity may be snuffed out by the Labor Party in the next six months. We want to act now. We want to have a go at doing this.’ Why is it that members of Groote, where you have got 40 men earning over $100,000 a year in the mines there who want to have the opportunity not to live in a rented house for the rest of their lives but actually put something into their own homes and put some roots down for their children like the rest of us do and be proud of what they hand over, are opposed by those opposite?

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