Marion Scrymgour (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I acknowledge and I pay my respects to the Ngunnawal and Ngambri people, the traditional owners and custodians of this land, to their elders past and present and to their young people, who will be the leaders of tomorrow. Awana. Awungana mamanta nee pupani, mudi intha. My Tiwi name is Mangaliliwayu. Awi ngiya-naringa, my mother; ngiya-rringani, my father; ngiya-puwi, my brothers; ngiya-ngilipi, my sisters: I pay my respects and think of you all today. To my children and my grandchildren: this is for you.

It is a great privilege and honour to have been elected as a member of the House of Representatives in the Australian Parliament, a privilege conferred on me by voters in the vast seat of Lingiari, which is about 1,348,157.94 square kilometres. It takes in the Territory of Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Territory of Christmas Island and the lion's share of the Northern Territory. I humbly thank everyone who put their confidence in me and the Australian Labor Party by giving us your vote. I also thank the many supporters and volunteers who worked on my campaign. They are too numerous to name, but they know who they are. It was a logistically challenging and exhausting journey—195 mobile booths across the bush—which I could not possibly have completed on my own, and definitely not without the assistance of the mighty trade union movement. I relied heavily on the guidance of my Indigenous Labor Party elders Minister Linda Burney and Uluru Statement from the Heart Special Envoy Pat Dodson, and the frequent companionship and collaborative assistance from my old friend and colleague from our time together in the Territory Parliament, Senator Malarndirri McCarthy.

Federal Labor showed the importance it attached to my part of the world through the visits to Lingiari made by an all-star team of frontbenchers and senior members: Penny Wong, Tanya Plibersek, Mark Butler, Catherine King, Tony Burke, Murray Watt, Brendan O'Connor, Jenny McAlister and Tim Ayres. If that's not a line-up, what is? These visits were all time-critical and difficult to arrange, and I am grateful to all involved.

I thank my family for their patience, especially my husband, David. You've been a source of strength for me over nearly 30 years of marriage. Your advice, love and support has kept me sane and balanced. I don't know if I've been able to do that to you! I so wish that my parents could have been alive with me on this day. My parents didn't have much, but they made sure that all my siblings and I—11 of us—had an education. Finally, I thank and acknowledge my predecessor, Warren Snowdon, for his dedicated service in representing the people of Lingiari for 35 years. I thank him for his strong support, advice and guidance to me, and for keeping me sane not just during the campaign but over many years of friendship.

As regards the Christmas and Cocos Islands, I want to carry on that tradition of being a Labor member who has your ear and back. These islands are strategically important to Australia, and it is vital that the Commonwealth works to support their economies and communities, in particular as regards Christmas Island. Critical infrastructure upgrades are needed to navigate the transition beyond phosphate mining. The rest of Lingiari sits in the mainland and in islands of the Northern Territory. It is an expansive land and water which is familiar to me but which still makes me stand in awe of its environmental complexities, its physical beauty across a range of different landscapes, and its capacity to sustain life and human economic activity.

The demographics of the population there are extraordinarily mixed, including in terms of age, religion and ethnic background. In the lead-up to the election campaign, I was honoured to have been invited to many cultural events within the Muslim community, and as a guest of Alice Springs locals who have migrated to Lingiari from the Indian subcontinent. The electorate also has a large number of people who have come from the Philippines, Europe and Africa. There are more, from a wide variety of other countries throughout the world, who have made Lingiari their home. They bring with them their skills and aspirations, and a desire to contribute as citizens.

But perhaps the key demographic statistic for Lingiari is that at the time of the 2016 census the population was 41.7 per cent Indigenous. In the 2021 census, the Indigenous represented 40.3 per cent of Lingiari. That is the highest percentage of any electorate in Australia. Whilst anyone elected as the member for Lingiari must, of course, champion the interests and aspirations of all constituents, the challenges and issues facing Aboriginal people and communities in Lingiari will be front of mind for me at all times. And there are significant challenges and issues to be addressed. Contrary to the way these things are sometimes presented in the media, they are not necessarily the same in each community. There is huge diversity amongst Aboriginal people and communities in Lingiari, consistent with the extensive geographical spread of people and languages, and their respective countries. From Aputula, or Finke, down near the South Australian border, to West and East Arnhem Land in the tropical north; and from Western Australia and the Queensland border, to Groote Eylandt in the gulf, the many tribes and language groups of Aboriginal people are committed to standing strong in their culture and, at the same time, engaging in the modern Australian economy.

Many groups have had the relative good fortune to have benefited from the strongest form of land rights tenure in the country. That is Commonwealth law. The Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976, or ALRA for short, underpins permanent land ownership in Aboriginal hands while at the same time giving security of tenure for any individual or entity approved by traditional owners to get a lease. ALRA also creates the capacity for binding and mutually beneficial agreements in relation to the use of land by governments and commercial entities like mining companies. Contrary to misinformation which has been peddled by ALRA opponents over decades, the lease based land tenure system which ALRA allows for is sophisticated and robust. Lease-based land tenure systems have been adopted elsewhere in Australia, especially here in the ACT. There are other groups whose country was allocated to settlers as pastoral leases on which to run cattle, and others, again, whose land was engulfed by towns. Native title is their only option for recognition of their traditional interests in the land. There are problems with how that is working out now, but that is a topic for discussion in a different speech on a different day.

Whatever the mechanisms of recognition of traditional interests in land under Aboriginal law, whether it is ALRA or native title, every Aboriginal Territorian—every Aboriginal person from the Territory—as a stake in and a responsibility for country somewhere. In many cases it is the responsibility for two countries, the responsibility having different content and being differently nuanced depending on whether it is father's country or mother's country. As a general rule, Aboriginal people speaking for and about their own country have a greater say about it than other Aboriginal people, even if those Aboriginal people have been living there for a long time. This is the fundamental social and political truth about remote Aboriginal communities, where traditional owners are often substantially outnumbered by people from other groups. It is these kinds of complexities that will inform the establishment and operation of a voice to parliament.

I was lucky enough to have been involved as a facilitator from the start of the dialogues which led to the historic Uluru Statement from the Heart. I know full well that the initiative is not mere symbolism. I am proud to be part of an Albanese Labor government which is going to take long overdue action on this front. I came here, to this place, as a Northern Territorian. I am not just from the Territory; I am of the Territory. I don't have links or ties anywhere else, and there is no plan B or interstate retirement strategy. My mother was Tiwi, and my father, even though he was traumatically separated from his country as a child, was an Anmatyerre man. I say that I am of the Territory not only because I am an Aboriginal Territorian but also because my family history reflects the impact of past government legislation and policies on people whose displacement and resulting disorientation left them with little else but a sense that, if nothing else, they were proper Territorians. You get a sense about yourself if, like my mother, you watched the Japanese planes drop their bombs on Darwin, and then, years later, you realised you had survived being placed in a leprosarium and then raising a softball team of eight young daughters. Suddenly it's 1979 and the Territory is being granted self-government. You say to yourself: 'Self-government is for Territorians—people who come from there, people who belong there. That's my mum and dad, and that's me.'

Before self-government, the Territory was run from here—from Canberra. It was the Canberra government which brought in the Northern Territory Aboriginal Ordinance, which regulated my parents' lives from when they were born up to 1957. It was the Canberra government which brought in the Social Welfare Ordinance, which took over after that and under which they were included in a register of controlled people—or what was commonly known as a 'stud book'. So my pride in commencing in my formal role in this House of Representatives is tinged with some sadness. I'm essentially becoming part of the same government which designated both of my parents as wards of the state, the state being the Commonwealth of Australia. Now that I am here, I want to make a difference for the better life for all Territorians, but, in particular, all Aboriginal Territorians.

The election result in Lingiari was close. Voter registration and voter participation were down—the lowest in the country—especially in the bush. In the main urban areas, some of the issues from the national campaign had traction. There were concerns about crime and about fracking in the Beetaloo sub-basin. In regard to that issue, I was grateful to former shadow minister for the environment and former member for Griffith Terri Butler for confirming that I was able to give a commitment that an Albanese government would amend the EPBC Act to extend existing water rights to shale gas projects; that there would be a federal EPA; and that the scrutiny of water impacts would be independent and rigorous and not delegated to the NT government as part of a one-stop-shop arrangement. With Terri's departure from parliament, we have lost an experienced and capable fighter for the environment.

Out bush there were different issues, including housing, roads, support for arts centres, ranger programs and fallout from the intervention and the supershires local government changes, which followed a year later. There was also unfinished business to do with respecting and resourcing homelands and bringing back the old CDP. There is a common thread which runs through the issue of support for homelands, bringing back the old CDP and building a safe and successful economy in Lingiari. I'll come back to that in a moment, but first I want to say a few things about the economy.

Lingiari doesn't have a manufacturing base, and it may never host the sort of factories and infrastructure which sprang up down south last century. But we have an expansive and valuable pastoral industry, a potential renewables bonanza and a tourism sector which is brimming with potential. All these things rely on a clean environment and access to land.

As regards the pastoral industry, huge areas of the Territory—including the Barkly Region, which is some of the best cattle country in the world—are dedicated to beef production. This pastoral estate includes some Aboriginal land areas, and the building and sealing of roads in these places benefit not just the cattle stations but also the Aboriginal community living areas—communities which are spread throughout the pastoral lands like a patchwork quilt. Many Aboriginal families have had generations of workers in the cattle industry. This pathway to employment for Aboriginal people is rarer these days than it was in the early sixties, but it needs to be encouraged and promoted.

Tourism is a complex and challenging business to be in, especially in this time of evolving pandemic rules and high fuel costs. But the sheer natural beauty and remoteness of our parks and other destinations, together with the opportunity for visitors to experience and be enriched by Aboriginal culture, are enduring drawcards. The main towns—in particular Alice Springs—are experiencing labour shortages when it comes to hospitality workers, which can at times be crippling. In the medium term, I would love to see young Aboriginal people taking and holding those jobs. Who better to showcase their country to the world?

Mining has been a huge contributor to the Northern Territory economy. The large mines that started up in the seventies—uranium at Ranger, bauxite at Gove and manganese on Groote Eylandt—have wound down or are in the process of coming to the end of their working lives. What we are seeing as a likely mining opportunity for the future is the extraction of minerals which are going to be required in the new industries and technologies built on renewables. The Finniss Lithium Project south of Darwin Port is likely to be the first in that regard. When it comes to renewables, nothing could be more exciting than the massive and innovative Sun Cable solar project, which is planning to harvest solar energy from far inland in the Australian continent and then deliver it in Singapore. Taking into account both the construction phase and its working life, the main site at Powell Creek in Jingili country has the potential to galvanise the Barkly economy. I will be keenly interested to do what I can to help maximise jobs and employment pathways for Aboriginal people from Elliott and surrounding communities.

Then there's the contentious topic of gas in the Beetaloo sub-basin. The rules have been stipulated in the Pepper report, and the environmental approval bars have been set very high. If the gas projects can secure environmental approval from both the Northern Territory and the federal EPA, the next thing that will need to be addressed is offsets.

The Pepper report says that any Beetaloo gas project must be carbon neutral and that the requirement to secure this rests not just with the Northern Territory government but also with the federal government. It is a shared obligation. There is a huge opportunity for the two governments to meet this challenge in a way that will turbocharge jobs and ranger programs out bush. I'm talking about the opportunity of working together with land councils and other stakeholders to establish carbon abatement programs run by Aboriginal rangers throughout the Northern Territory. The number of jobs to be filled could be substantial, and the resulting employment opportunities and associated support funding could transform many communities. It could give them an opportunity to be involved in vitally important work—vitally important for their country and vitally important for the planet.

Lingiari is both the heartland of and the gateway to Australia. A defence presence in Lingiari is fundamental to the current and future security of our country. I mentioned previously the bombing of Darwin. It wasn't just Darwin that got hit. The Japanese strike got as far down the track as Katherine. Australia was vulnerable at the time, and the price of preserving our free and democratic way of life is continuing support of and investment in our defence forces and bases.

In Lingiari this includes the stationing of forces, including visiting US Marines, at Robertson Barracks, Bradshaw Station, Delamere bombing range and the Tindal air base near Katherine. The defence personnel who come to the Lingiari electorate often spend years there, and the maintenance and expansion of the defence force bases is an important driver for our economy. The defence force presence in Lingiari represents a conventional hard power commitment to our national security, but there is an equally important way in which the federal government can commit to our national security by focusing its attention on Lingiari. It is by preparing and implementing a comprehensive upgrade of community infrastructure in the bush and working closely with the Northern Territory government to ensure that Aboriginal communities are safe and successful. Why do I say this? It is because, for many years now, and with increasing intensity recently, the soft power dimensions of regional security rivalry have been played out throughout competing historical and cultural narratives.

There is a narrative deployed against Australia, aimed at undermining our capacity to win friends and influence neighbours in our region, which goes something like this: 'Australia is an artificial colonial construct which subjugates its Aboriginal people, does the bidding of the Americans and consists mainly of cities hugging the coastline of the eastern seaboard. It doesn't really occupy or have an effective presence in its remote hinterland.'

We know those things aren't true, but they gain traction when the public perception of everyday life out bush is recent footage and stories from Wadeye. Addressing what has happened there would be a speech on its own, but, long story short, as a nation we need to be able to present a different narrative, one which demonstrates support and resourcing for remote communities and emphasises success stories and reason for optimism.

Investing in overcoming the infrastructure deficits in central and northern Australia is not just a down payment on securing social justice; it is an investment in our national security. The same thing goes for fully funding a genuine jobs program like the old CDEP. Inculcating a culture of pride in employment in remote Aboriginal communities pays dividends that benefit all taxpayers and can help to integrate young Aboriginal people into employer organisations, including regional local government entities. Embracing a remote community revitalisation plan along these lines will enable our neighbours in Asia and the Pacific to be reassured about our credentials as a modern post-colonial nation which does not merely pay lip service to honouring its Indigenous people but actually takes real action to facilitate their progress and advancement.

Various people, including me, have been talking about the need for this sort of federal funding commitment for over 20 years. During that time many of us have used the catchphrase a 'Marshall Plan for the bush'. You could say that there was a Marshall Plan aspect to the housing and infrastructure dimension of the Stronger Futures legislation which extended it. The intervention was an exercise in bad faith and it is what I opposed. No-one was ever opposed to the extra funding.

Another aspect that continued under Stronger Futures was alcohol restrictions. I just need to quickly touch on this. I have spoken to the federal Minister for Indigenous Australians as well as the Northern Territory Chief Minister about the alcohol restrictions out bush, which were basically a bogus or a gammon recalibration of strong measures under the Northern Territory legislation which had been adopted by community elders many years before that. No significant changes arise from the lapsing of the Stronger Futures, but the application of the alcohol restrictions to town camp communities in our towns, such as Alice Springs, Tennant Creek and Katherine, was new and modestly transformational.

You can agree or disagree with the town camp alcohol restrictions which were in place. They were put there under the original intervention legislation and continued under Stronger Futures as a special measure under the Racial Discrimination Act, but you need to bear in mind that the special measures were left in place for about 14 years. When a government puts in a protective regime of that kind and leaves it in place for that long, you can't just suddenly pull the pin on it without any protection, sanctuary or plan for the vulnerable women and children whom the original measure was supposed to protect. To do that is more negligent—at the level of impact on actual lives it is tantamount to causing injury by omission. It is like pulling your forces out of Afghanistan but leaving the local workers and their dependants in harm's way on the ground without an escape plan, but that is what has happened.

I'm not saying that the town camp alcohol measures should have continued, but I am saying that, before they were allowed to lapse, many organisations and many Aboriginal people called on the former government to look at harm minimisation and that should have been properly addressed. That is the work that should have been done 12 months ago. The horse has now bolted. The new federal Labor government isn't in a position to reinstate expired legislation, and it shouldn't.

Some commentators have justified the removal of the town camp restrictions by invoking self-determination. I think that this is ridiculous and ludicrous. It is not self-determination to facilitate the non-traditional lifestyle choice of an Aboriginal drinker—usually, but not always, male—to bring takeaway alcohol into a family home even though there is an alternative option available of drinking at licensed premises. It's not self-determination for an Aboriginal family member—usually, but not always, female—to be assaulted in or near their home environment by the drinker, after intoxication turns to anger and erupts in violence. And it is certainly not self-determination for an Aboriginal child to be constantly exposed to alcohol abuse in the home and to the violence which results from it.

What is at least needed is for both governments—and I have been heartened by my conversations with the federal Minister for Indigenous Australians and the Northern Territory Chief Minister—to work out a plan to protect those innocent victims who are being swamped by waves of violence now that takeaway alcohol is getting let back into our town camps. We need to do more consultation about what happens next. It needs to be comprehensive. It needs to include a separately resourced and supported voice at the table for women in particular, victims of domestic violence. And it needs to involve listening to the advice of health experts and taking into account statistics and reporting relating to the incidence and circumstances of relevant alcohol related offending and harm.

I stand here and applaud all of the work of our hardworking and dedicated men and women who are working in the field of domestic and family violence and child protection services throughout the Lingiari electorate. In particular, I have to single out Shirleen Campbell and the other members of the Tangentyere Women's Family Safety Group. I acknowledge the emphasis they place on working with men to change their thinking and behaviour. Moving forward, targeted programs like that have to be part of the solution. It is important not to make men think that they are being pre-emptively labelled and vilified, but, in the meantime, protections need to be put in place. This is an emergency issue which needs urgent attention—not an intervention like in 2007, but for both Labor governments to work collaboratively together in order to maintain community safety and dedicate some time to work out a sustainable plan for the future. Our young people deserve no less. Ideally a consensus outcome could be achieved which will give us a road map to living with alcohol in the medium term but which maintains protection of the vulnerable in the short term.

The Prime Minister's commitment to the nation about no-one getting left behind has given me and many Aboriginal people in the Lingiari electorate hope and inspiration in being part of this Labor team. The way forward in Lingiari is for all Territorians to move forward while not letting Aboriginal families get left behind.

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