Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Minister for Community Services) Share this | Hansard source

We have suddenly discovered that the hidden wealth of Australia’s mineral resources is in fact hiding under each and every one of the 63 prescribed communities! Give me a break. This is a serious matter, and you are suddenly putting to this place that this is some kind of a Trojan Horse so that we can mine the area of the townships.

Perhaps I should describe the nature of the prescribed communities. We are talking about the area literally around where the houses are at the moment. We have a community and basically the boundary fence of the community is there, and that is where we are talking about. Having a radioactive waste facility, a mine or mining infrastructure there is not the intention. As I have said, it seems so silly to stand in this place and work through and guarantee all the things that we are not doing. We could spend forever here. Your particular bent is ensuring that there is no assistance given to mining. This legislation is specifically to provide infrastructure to help out Indigenous Australians. The land is not being privatised. The things that government is able to do with the land are spelt out in the legislation. Whilst I am more than happy, in the spirit of trying to get through this, to continue to do this, I would say that all of the amendments you are discussing are already behind us. They have already been voted on. There are no amendments that we are currently considering, or are likely to consider, that cover this area.

In light of some of the previous discussions we have had in this place, I have continued to debate this issue and provide information where I can, even though there is no reason for me to do so, because it has already been debated. If I am showing some frustration I apologise; it is not normally my way, Senator Milne. You can continue to ask questions about what we are not going to do. I would prefer if we could just focus on the bits of the legislation that concern you about what we have allowed. We have been quite prescriptive in the legislation about what the government are able to do in these communities, and it reflects our clear intention to make these communities better places to be.