Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

When the member for Warringah first introduced the Wild Rivers (Environmental Management) Bill 2011, he said that he was working for the economic advancement of Aboriginal people, that economic development is important to the future of Aboriginal people and that access to the benefits of all Australians is the right of Aboriginal people. In this view, he is not alone. Many of us on both sides of the House have worked hard on the issue of Indigenous economic development.

The member for Leichhardt has done a great deal in his own electorate, but I need to correct a couple of statements he made in his speech. He said that clauses 4(3)(b) and 6 were new; that is not in fact the case. Those clauses were in the 2010 bill.

As a member of that House of Representatives Standing Committee on Economics I visited Far North Queensland in late November 2010 and early March of this year. Our inquiry was broadly into Indigenous economic development, not just the wild rivers issue. We heard from over 50 people in the public hearings and took 39 submissions. We visited Brisbane, Cairns, Weipa, Bamaga and the Chuulangun Aboriginal Corporation in Far North Queensland. What quickly became apparent to all of us on the committee was that Indigenous economic development in Cape York is a complex and an important issue.

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