Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If it was a proper and fair world, Jason Ned, the mayor of Doomadgee, would have died with a pastoral lease the same as every other cattleman in Australia. He was a First Australian and chose to live in his family's homeland, Doomadgee, north-west Queensland. So much centred around Jason in our battle for land rights in Australia. This bloke ran the camps for one of the biggest cattle operations in Australia's history. He mustered over 70,000 head of cattle per year. He was head stockman. There are few people in world history that have been responsible in their lifetime for mustering over a million head of cattle.

Jason spearheaded the fight to get landownership off the state and federal governments, who control all of the Aboriginal lands in Queensland. They look after it for the custodians, and we thank them! First Australians can't get pastoral leases. Whitefellas can get pastoral leases; blackfellas can't. What use is it then to have all these nice-sounding phrases about First Australians when we can't get to own a piece of land in our own country, where we've lived for 40,000 years. Jason's gone to his death with no right to that land except squatter's rights. I proudly say that we Australians that came to Australia seized squatter's rights because the government wouldn't give us the land either. It was empty, and they wouldn't give it to us—and they're not giving it to us again now.

Jason was five-eighth in the heyday of the mid-west rugby league competition, where the Doomadgee Dragons won four premierships. He has been a highly respected mayor and long-serving councillor. He was a colossus. He should be a colossus to every single person in Australia.

Along with Troy Fraser, we were in the process of issuing our own Doomadgee First Australian title deeds. You whitefellas won't give it to us, so we're just going to take it. And, if you contest us in the courts, we will win. It'll be Mabo 2, and we will win. The key to this, of course, was Jason Ned, who by himself had got nearly a thousand head of wild cattle together, but he had no land title. A thousand head of cattle is worth about $1.3 million. This man created $1.3 million, and his nation would not even give him the right to own his own land—his own land, where his forebears have lived for 40,000 years.

The loss of Jason Ned, his death two weeks ago—I personally couldn't think straight for a week afterwards. Everything centred around Jason. Jason Ned, who died on 22 July 2023, is to my mind one of the First Australians' greatest heroes ever. God will give him a high place in heaven. (Time expired)