Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

I will try to keep this brief but I think that some of the remarks, particularly those from Senator Crossin, need a response. To Senator Siewert: if you think this is politically advantageous you certainly were not standing in Lingiari with me; I can give you the drum. But I will get to that in a minute.

I would like to take the opportunity to thank Senator Crossin for making my argument. She does make the point that of course open communities are doing so much better—places like Hermannsburg—and the developments in some other places are always associated with open communities. This whole notion of the permit being somehow part of reconciliation and somehow part of recognising culture is absolute and utter garbage. It is the sort of leftie statement that belongs back in the ‘I don’t even get it’ days. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever to connect a lawful right of access with reconciliation.

I am not sure if you have been listening to your own media, Senator Crossin, but do not get us wrong: I support the permit system too; of course I do. I believe that for those people who have land we should have the permit system to go there. But I believe the excision of a main road to a hospital, a post office or an airport is entirely legitimate because it provides opportunities for those communities and in fact opens up those communities. But all other areas, 99.8 per cent of Indigenous land, will still require a permit, and of course we support that.

I want to revisit for a moment what Senator Crossin said, which was that the permit is still an important tool for police officers. I do not know how many times you change a tyre, Senator Crossin, but one spanner at a time is really advised, and you use the best one. The capacity for police officers in the Northern Territory to pull people over and search them completely is a far greater and more comprehensive power than the permit system. That is the point I am making.

I turn back to Senator Siewert’s remarks—I am not directing this at you, Senator Siewert—about how politically foolish this all was. Perhaps it might have been, but I can recall being in those areas and people coming to me very angry. In fact, when they were screwing those how-to-vote cards up they were throwing them at me. I was spat on; I was threatened. Many of these people are my friends. I have known them for some time. I asked them, ‘What is the problem?’ They said there were three problems with this. They said that they had been told; they understood what was happening: I personally was going to come and take their children from them, Senator Crossin. They were pretty cross with that, I can tell you, and I do not blame them.