Tania Lawrence (Hasluck, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

'Coming from all points of the southern sky'—does that sound familiar? It's part of the opening sentence of the Uluru Statement from the Heart:

We, gathered at the 2017 National Constitutional Convention, coming from all points of the southern sky, make this statement from the heart …

In my first speech, which seems a long time ago but hasn't quite been a year, much less 60,000 years, I reflected on the fact that it is a lot to stand anywhere and purport to represent anyone. And, yet, we do this. It is the nature of our democracy, our very system of government. We do our best. The representatives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who met at Uluru and who initiated the Uluru Statement from the Heart and so the campaign for a constitutionally enshrined Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to this parliament also sought to represent. They called for voice, treaty and truth, and they named them in that order. Not everyone agrees on this order. That's okay.

There will be a referendum later this year. I've been proud to serve on the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters which reviewed the legislation for that referendum. The Uluru statement mentions the Constitution not once but four times. Constitutional change is required because, after having failed to properly listen to Indigenous people for over 200 years, this country needs as an enshrined voice which cannot be easily overlooked. The torment of powerlessness needs to be met with a change at the very heart of our power, the Constitution.

Centuries ago now the first representatives of the British Crown were instructed to take possession of land with consent. If they thought they had consent, they weren't listening. It's time to start listening. Sovereignty is also mentioned in the Uluru statement. It is there described as 'a spiritual notion' that 'has never been ceded or extinguished and co-exists with the sovereignty of the Crown'. As Teangi Brown wrote in 2016 on the wall of the National Museum of Australia: 'There is no separation between country and culture. They're one and the same, intertwined.' This is the basis upon which the voice campaign establishes itself.

Some have raised a red herring in this discussion and suggested that efforts to establish a constitutional voice would be better directed towards closing the gap. It is not, and never was, a choice between these ends. Successive governments have invested in closing the gap. Progress is glacial. Something has to change. Both symbolism and action are important. The voice will help ensure targeted place based solutions.

Minister Burney released the Closing the Gap: Commonwealth implementation plan this week. It details hundreds of millions of dollars of funding directed towards better outcomes. This government will continue to invest in closing the gap. The next government will do the same—and the next and the next. Every one of those governments will benefit from having the voice in place, benefit from expert advice, born of lived experience and millennia of wisdom, and benefit from criticism from the same source.

There is an unfortunate error that has crept into the discussion about the Voice to Parliament. That error is the idea that this campaign somehow originated with the Labor Party or with the PM or with Minister Burney. It's an error that's easy to make, especially given the way in which some politicians on both the Left and the Right have dragged their feet or wilfully inserted themselves in a sad and desperate attempt to make this issue about them. It's wrong. The Prime Minister has spoken many times of a hand outstretched from Uluru to the rest of Australia. He speaks of an offer made to all Australians. He speaks of the Voice to Parliament as an opportunity for us all. The voice is recognition, respect and reconciliation and it provides a pathway to treaty and truth. It is our chance to walk forward as one.

House adjourned at 19:59