Kate Chaney (Curtin, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

CHANEY ( ) ( ): I rise to speak in response to the 15th anniversary of the National Apology to the Stolen Generations and the introduction of the latest Closing the Gap implementation plan. I'm not going to reiterate the statistics about Aboriginal disadvantage, which remain shocking. Instead, I want to share what I've learned about why investing and building relationships and respect is important and practical and what I think we have to learn from Aboriginal culture in relation to the apology and the Voice.

Just after the apology, I was Manager of Aboriginal Affairs at Wesfarmers. It was a steep learning curve about Aboriginal history and culture, guided by some wonderfully wise Noongar leaders. Like so many others, the more I learned about Aboriginal history and culture, the more I realised I didn't know. I had a number of moments on my cultural awareness journey that were characterised by the feeling of having the rug pulled out from underneath me—moments when I realised that all I confidently believed to be true was a bit shaky. It made me question so many of my own assumptions.

Here's an example. The Noongar people in the south-west of WA recognise six seasons during the year. They see the weather, plants and animals change every year through this cycle of six seasons: from Makuru, fertility; Djilba, conception; Kambarang, birth; Birak, childhood; Bunuru, adolescence; Djeran, maturity; and back to Makuru, fertility, again.

After I'd been working with Aboriginal people for a while, I heard from someone—and I can't remember who—about how they saw the same cycle applied to everything, even project management and social change. As a former management consultant, I loved a good framework, so I found this fascinating. They said that every project followed the same cycle of life, from fertility to conception, birth, childhood, adolescence and maturity. I remember Noongar people chuckling about how non-Indigenous people always want to rush to the season of birth and start a new project before investing the time in fertility and conception. This, they said, was the reason Wadjela projects often failed. They didn't spend time building the strong foundation of respect and relationships before diving in.

How could something be successful if you haven't done the work to truly listen to and understand each other and work out together what it is you want to achieve? It's as ridiculous as Married at First Sight or, even worse, starting with the birth of a child together. For me, this was so insightful. It made me look very differently at various projects, especially projects aimed at solving problems for Aboriginal people.

Marking 15 years since we acknowledged a difficult part of our history gives us the opportunity to think in longer time frames, not 60,000-year time frames but at least decades. The apology created a fertile space to acknowledge our history and redefine our common direction. Now, the Uluru statement is a generous invitation to invest the time in listening and understanding. It's an acknowledgement that we are in the season of makuru, the season of fertility. We have the ideas, but we're not yet ready to implement them.

There is of course pressure to address the very urgent issue we see around the country, whether in Alice Springs or Banksia Hill Detention Centre. This is urgent and we must try, but we are doing it again: we're jumping to the season of birth, because it's urgent. We can and we must do two things at once. The reality is that we don't know how to fix the shocking issues in many of our communities. We have tried many things and, largely, they have not worked. Governments are not good at relinquishing control, and even if the idea of partnership and shared control is appealing, in reality our systems resist it. It's hard for politicians to admit they don't have the answers.

First Nations people don't necessarily have all of the answers either, but the statistics in our annual Closing the gap report mean that we must face the fact that we are more likely to find the answers by listening. We need to build a strong foundation, a foundation of commitment and openness. We won't get the Voice model exactly right the first time. It might take years to iterate and refine it. Freezing the model in 2023 would be a mistake. We need to retain the flexibility to continue to improve it through our parliament. But if we are committed to the concept of a voice in our Constitution, we are committed to continuing to try, and we are committed to continuing to listen.

We can show that we have learned something from the longest continuing culture in the world. We have learned about long-term thinking and the importance of listening and understanding. This lesson can be a gift from the ancient cultures that are truly Australian. There are so many ways we can apply this lesson to how we think about our world. Without the Voice, I suspect we will be here and another 15 years wondering why all the effort and money we have invested in projects designed in Canberra by politicians and public servants aren't working. Through the Voice, let's invest in building relationships and respect. Let's invest in listening and learning. Let's commit, in our Constitution, to continuing to try to get it right together.

Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There are moments in time and events that become embedded in our memories—moments of profound personal or public importance that sometimes change our outlook on life, that may bring an era to an end or that may herald a new direction. The national apology delivered by former prime minister Kevin Rudd on 13 February 2008 was one such moment. It brought an end to decades of disgraceful denial and terrible injustices perpetrated against Australia's Indigenous people. The apology brought dignity and respect to people who, since white settlement, had been discriminated against and disadvantaged. For most Australians it brought a divided nation together. It was one of the most significant and meaningful acts of our national parliament, I believe, since federation over 100 years earlier.

On Monday morning, as I watched the film clips of that memorable day, which I was fortunate enough to attend, it reinforced in my mind the historical significance of 13 of February 2008. The faces of those people present, both inside this building and outside, picked up by the cameras said it all. It just showed the impact it had on their lives. It was significant not because it rectified all of the wrongs of the past, or that it would fix all of the problems and disadvantages that still exist, but because it signalled a new approach to dealing with the unfinished business that needed to be resolved. It gave hope to the tens of thousands of Indigenous people—and, equally to many, many other Australians who, for so long, were looking for answers—but particularly for the Indigenous people who had suffered throughout all of that time.

All of that was put into context in another captivating speech by former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. Unlike his 2008 speech, which was made in the chamber, the speech on Monday was made in the Great Hall and will never be recorded in Hansard. My personal view is that it should be recorded in Hansard. I will not propose that we incorporate it today, because I have not spoken to members of the opposition about that. But certainly I would encourage anyone who is listening to my remarks today to read Kevin Rudd's speech—a speech entitled 'The arc of history bending slowly towards justice'. It was not only a speech that I believe outlined the process of white settlement in this country and Indigenous disadvantage and how we have slowly tried to change that. It also talked about the future and where we need to go.

It has taken 235 years to address many of the injustices faced by Australia's First Nations people. Yes, we still have a long way to go. And can I say, with respect to that, that the proposed Voice to Parliament, as Kevin Rudd quite rightly pointed out—which will be an advisory body to parliament—is I believe another slow step towards the justice and equality that need to be addressed here in Australia.

I want to talk briefly about a couple of other matters. I note that the Leader of the Opposition is calling for another royal commission as his alternative proposal to the Voice. In 1987 the government of the day instigated the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. That commission ended up with 339 recommendations. Of those recommendations, only 64 have been adopted or carried through with. That commission was headed by Elliott Johnston, a Supreme Court judge from South Australia, with the support of Pat Dodson, now a senator in this place.

Elliott Johnston was someone I knew well. Years later, he addressed a forum in the city of Salisbury. I had asked him to come along and address a forum on Indigenous matters in respect of his role as the commissioner of that inquiry. We heard directly from him about many of the issues he had heard of in his inquiry and about his own frustration that the recommendations he had put forward had not been followed through with. It is now some three decades later, and those recommendations have still not all been adopted. So, I stress this point. Royal commissions are important. They certainly bring to a head the very issues that we need to deal with. But they don't always resolve them. It takes governments who want to embrace the recommendations and follow through with them to do that.

The subsequent royal commission led to the Bringing them home report and was headed by Sir Ronald Wilson and, interestingly, supported by Mick Dodson. That report was presented to parliament in April 1997. Immediately upon its being presented to parliament I contacted Sir Ronald Wilson and asked him to address a forum, again in the city of Salisbury, on his findings and his work on that commission. He agreed, and he came out here. In fact, it was his first public appearance since presenting the report to parliament. I heard directly from Sir Ronald Wilson about his inquiry. He talked about how it nearly brought him to tears as he was listening to the evidence being presented to him about the injustices in the course of the inquiry.

That report was handed down in April 1997—again, a quarter of a century ago. Have we embraced and adopted, in the spirit intended, all those recommendations? My answer is that no, we have not. Whilst I understand the Leader of the Opposition suggesting that we need another royal commission, I say to the members of this place: it's not a royal commission we need. I think we all know what the issues are that need to be addressed. We need a parliament that is prepared to move forward with the recommendations that have been presented to this parliament in the past, and with respect to other inquiries that have been made by members of this parliament, and deal with those very issues and get on with adopting the recommendations. That is what we need to do.

I believe the Voice to Parliament, as Kevin Rudd quite rightly said, an advisory body, is another step towards doing exactly that. The 15-year anniversary was also a reminder of the unfinished business that we as a parliament have to deal with. I commend the minister's statement to the House.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I acknowledge that we meeting on Ngunnawal and Ngambri territory. I also acknowledge the Wiradjuri people who are the custodians of the Riverina electorate that I proudly serve in this place. I acknowledge two proud Wiradjuri elders, Aunty Kath Withers and Aunty Isabel Reid, who recently, on the eve of Australia Day, were awarded a prestigious Walk of Honour in Wagga Wagga, which means they will have a plaque in the main street, Baylis Street. Forevermore, people will be able to look at that plaque, acknowledge what they have done—not just for the Indigenous community, not just for Wiradjuri people, but for Wagga Wagga and beyond—with their efforts, with their advocacy, to build a better community.

I want to also acknowledge Kyle Yanner. Kyle is a mayor at Mornington Island in the Gulf of Carpentaria. I met him in June 2021. In February 2023 that community still does not have a water park, water feature or swimming pool for its 1,200 or so residents, many of whom are young, many of whom are mere children. In this day and age, I find that a complete disgrace, the fact that a community of that size—and in the gulf, where it gets very hot not just in summer months—doesn't have a water facility they can call their own.

They put an application in as part of the Building Better Regions Fund, that now defunct program whereby regional electorates were given funding. Mornington Island is part of the Leichhardt electorate, so it's a long, long way from the Riverina and Central West I represent. But I gave those people a commitment that we would get them a water park, and I remain committed to that. I have seen the now Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government on a number of occasions to push the case for Mornington Island, to push the case for Councillor Yanner and his community, and I will continue to do so. I will harp on about it until we get an outcome.

We talk about Closing the Gap and the National Apology to the Stolen Generation. Many people quote Aboriginal dialect and Torres Strait Islander dialect, and anecdotal incidents themselves. That's all well and good; that's all fine. But it's not just what we do in this place, and it's not just those apologies we make, it's what we do out in our electorates and it's the funding we deliver for communities, such as Mornington Island, which make a real difference. It's all well and good to say, 'I'm sorry,' and to do welcome to country and all of that, but it's the real, practical difference that we can make as politicians, as parliamentarians, as legislators, that those people out there are seeking. They don't want our apologies and, quite frankly, our welcomes to country. They want a swimming pool, so they can swim in it during summer. They want real, practical determinations and outcomes. That's the most we can do.

I was just at a press conference with National Party and LNP colleagues about banking services. Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price made a very good point, about how you see the chief executive officers—very well-paid, I might add—of our major banks getting all woke and wanting to work on Australia Day yet not wanting to have branches in regional communities, where a high proportion of the population are Indigenous people. It's not good enough that the bank CEOs can withdraw those services while at the same time gadding around their boardroom tables, expressing their sorrow and expressing welcomes to country. They do that on the one hand, but at the same time pull out banking services to remote Indigenous communities. It's just remarkable that this can happen. As Senator Nampijinpa Price said, on their letterheads and e-mails there are welcomes to country and they are expressing what particular Aboriginal territory they are writing their emails from. Yet, at the same time, those e-mails are closing banking services in regional and remote communities, which is really disadvantageous to our Aboriginal populations.

Fifteen years ago, former prime minister Rudd issued an apology. That was a good thing, and I know the effort that has been made since then to close the gap. We've gone a long way. Have we gone far enough? No, not at all. I must pay tribute to former senator Nigel Scullion from the Northern Territory, a former colleague of the member for Wide Bay and of mine, for the efforts he went to make sure that Aboriginal people, whenever there was infrastructure being built, were going to be trained up and working on those particular projects and in those particular programs. That is a real, meaningful and practical way that we can close the gap—giving Aboriginal people that incentive, that hope and that income.

I know that when I was the infrastructure minister and we were looking at Inland Rail and Snowy 2.0, so many Indigenous people said to me at the time that it was so good for their communities and their people, because, in many cases, whether it was the Parkes-Narromine section of Inland Rai or what they were doing at Cabramurra or Tumut or Talbingo for Snowy Hydro, it was the first job some of those Aboriginal people had had. And it was not only about Aboriginal people having their first job; indeed, Aboriginal small businesses were able to tap into and gain procurement through the process. They were being given a hand up, for sure, but they needed it, and it made such a difference to them. I know of some firms that expanded multiple times to be able to cater for, provide the ballast or hospitality for the workers and the like for Inland Rail. The one-stop shop that was opened in Parkes had a number of Indigenous people walk through the door and come out with a job—with hope and with prospects for the future. That's what it's all about. With the Parkes to Narromine section, there were many jobs created from that for Indigenous people alone. That was fantastic.

In Defence, the Defence Indigenous employment program provides a five-month residential course focusing on six key areas with Indigenous mentors at Kapooka: military skills, language, physical fitness, cultural appreciation, leadership and development. It has been highly successful in getting Indigenous people into Defence. I don't think we've gone anywhere near enough in our recognition of the efforts that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have made as soldiers and in other services in the defence and protection of our nation. That service is a good thing.

Charles Sturt University, which started in my hometown of Wagga Wagga, has an aim of employing at least three per cent of their workforce as Aboriginal staff. Three per cent might not sound like much, but it's a good start. And at least by making the assurance they will do that, it's a long way, perhaps, from where many other tertiary institutions have been in the past. This progress is a good thing.

I also want to say that it cuts both ways. I know there was a diabolical interview on 2GB yesterday where Sydney councillor Yvonne Weldon got on there to talk about rubbish bin collection. She started off by expressing the view that it was a great day—14 February—because it was the anniversary of the death of James Cook in 1779. Thankfully, the interviewer, Chris O'Keefe, just cut her off, and so he should have. It does cut both ways. It's all well and good to be talking about things that are good for her mob, but it's not good to talk about those sorts of things which are just beyond reprehensible. I'm glad that the interviewer cut her short and told her that it wasn't acceptable, that it was demeaning and that it shouldn't have occurred.

This is an important anniversary. The Stolen Generations need to be recognised, apologies need to be given and we need to do more on closing the gap. I acknowledge the motion and I acknowledge the fine words of both the Prime Minister and the opposition leader on this motion.

Luke Gosling (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too acknowledge the Ngunnawal and the Ngambri people, and the Larrakia people, the traditional owners of my electorate. I spoke with a Larrakia elder this morning who is in Parliament House talking to people about the reality of the voice and what it will do—the powerful, practical advantage in having a formalised voice. For any member of the parliament who wants to speak with her and learn from her wisdom and perspective, I'm certainly happy to organise that.

It was also good to catch up with my mate Kevin Rudd while he was here in the building over the last couple of days. I remember well 13 February 2008, when he made a formal apology on behalf of the nation to Australia's Indigenous peoples. The apology was particularly made to the Stolen Generations and their families and communities for laws and policies which had inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss. It was incredibly moving to join members of the Stolen Generations on Monday morning for the 15th anniversary of the National Apology to the Stolen Generations.

Last week our government and the Northern Territory government announced a landmark package for Central Australia to improve community safety, to tackle alcohol-related harm and to provide more opportunities, particularly for young people, in our Red Centre. In addressing the past decade's decline in investment and services, we will invest in a plan for improved community safety and cohesion, job creation, investing in families, improving school attendance and school completion through caring for culture and country, and preventing and addressing the issues caused by fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, or FASD. Hopefully, more honourable members are starting to learn about how damaging that particular disorder is. In addition, the Closing the Gap implementation plan is our plan to work with First Nations organisations and communities, and all levels of government, to make serious progress on closing the gap in life outcomes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. Sadly, the latest annual report on closing the gap shows that the gap in many measures is not closing—or at least not fast enough—and on some measures it is, regrettably, going backwards. We see encouraging progress, like more babies being born with a healthy birth weight, more children enrolled in preschool and higher numbers of high school graduations, but we also see a disappointing lack of progress in a number of other areas, including the amount of children in out-of-home care—not with their parents or their kin but in out-of-home care—and the adult and child imprisonment rates, which are, frankly, a blight on our nation.

Our 2023 implementation plan invests almost half a billion dollars towards closing the gap, and includes but is not limited to $150 million over four years to target First Nations water infrastructure through the National Water Grid Fund, providing save and reliable water for remote and regional Indigenous communities. I can tell you that in the Northern Territory there are some communities that do not have safe and reliable water. There's $111 million for a one-year partnership with the Northern Territory government to accelerate the building of new housing in remote areas so that we can address the problem of overcrowding, which in remote communities leads to really bad health and social outcomes. There's almost $12 million over two years for the national strategy for food security in First Nations communities so that we can make essential foods more affordable and more accessible, particularly in that remote community context. And, yes, in the Northern Territory there are communities that do not have a good standard of accessible and affordable daily needs as far as food security goes.

We'll continue funding—$68.6 million over two years—for family violence and prevention legal service providers that deliver that vital legal and nonlegal support to women and children experiencing family, domestic and sexual violence. Almost $22 million over five years will be spent to support families through seven place-based, trauma-aware and culturally responsive healing programs for those impacted by family violence or at risk of engagement with child protection services and being taken into out-of-home care. We want to keep families together. If they can't be with their parents, we want to keep them with kin. We know that's when they'll be their healthiest, happiest and safest.

There's also $38.4 million over four years to boost on country education for First Nations students, and this includes junior rangers and greater access to culturally appropriate learning. Again, we know the kids will develop educationally and spiritually in a more healthy way if they are connected to their culture. There's also $21.6 million to support quality boarding school accommodation for rural and remote students for an additional year.

Closing the gap is a top priority of the Albanese Labor federal government. We will only build a better future for all Australians if we take serious action to address the inequalities that we see in our land. Our measures will be designed and delivered in partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians because the best solutions, and this is the foundation of the Voice and why it's so important, come from the people on the ground who know what's needed and feed that advice through their representatives to inform our work in this place.

As we reflect on reconciliation, it's important that we recall that the Uluru Statement from the Heart, which is now six years old, is a culmination of years of discussion, consultation and hard work by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Establishing a Voice is essential in helping us close the gap. It will further enhance the strength of First Nations voices in the development of laws and policies that will affect them. Recognition is the 'what', the Voice is the 'how' that recognition will see practical changes. It's not a funding body, it's not a third chamber of parliament, it won't run programs, it won't have a veto. It's about recognition of our continent, our ancient continent, and the First Nations people, and for that to be recognised in the birth certificate of our nation.

Reconciliation is a national journey that we must all embark on together, but it's also one of individual learning and growth. In the time remaining I will reflect a little bit on my journey of reconciliation, my personal story and what I've learned along the way. My father, John, worked with blind people in a leprosarium in Derby, Western Australia, and that's how we as a family, how us kids growing up first got to understand the magic nature of this longest-surviving culture on Earth.

A little bit after that, I went and stayed with some friends of ours on a mission. It was a little bit inland from Geraldton, in a place that was called the Tardun kids home. I had an experience there, on the ground, with kids my own age. I saw the anger in them about the way that they and their families had been taken off their land. It was a real eye-opener. As a young fella, I felt at the time that I was seen as being responsible somehow, as a non-Indigenous kid, for what happened to them.

It made me step back for a while, until I became a Territorian and started living in the Territory. I saw people like the legendary Northern Territory football player Michael Long, who got up one day and started walking to Canberra to force John Howard to start caring about Indigenous people and the shocking states that they were living in around our nation. He was not necessarily a Labor man; Michael Long just wanted some justice and wanted the suicides to stop. He walked from Melbourne to Canberra, and I joined him on the road and learned from the elders, particularly from the Gunditjmara. I got an understanding of history and the 15-year war that the Gunditjmara fought for their own lands.

It's a humbling thing to learn from them. I learnt more later on in my career, and I'm always happy to talk to honourable members about my experiences and what I learned about First Nations people in our nation.

James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.