Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise this afternoon to add my comments to this debate on the Native Title Amendment (Indigenous Land Use Agreements) Bill 2017. Firstly, to contribute to the comments made previously by Senator Siewert and Senator Waters, it is a disgrace how the government has handled this piece of legislation in this place. It is an absolute exploitation of the fundamental issue of land rights in this country, again, with Indigenous people simply being used and abused when it suits the government. We all know why there was a suspension of standing orders earlier today by the Leader of the Government in the Senate to try to bring on this bill and ram it through this house tonight. That, of course, is because the government are more interested in the rights of mining companies than they are in the rights of Indigenous people.

There are fundamental issues with the bill. We know we need to consider it in proper detail. Instead, all the government gives a damn about is giving a free pass to the mega coal company Adani. It is not even an Australian company. It is a dodgy, corrupt company based in India that is already under excessive investigation for corruption, money laundering, tax evasion—the list goes on. Why on earth are we seeing our parliament hijacked by a dodgy company like this, via the government of the day, just so that the company can get their project up off the ground? And let us not forget it is with the help of $1 billion of Australian taxpayers' money, offered up at mates rates by the Turnbull government.

It is absolutely appalling to see our parliament hijacked by such a corrupt, dodgy coal company. It proves just how much this government really is in the pocket of the fossil fuel industry. What on earth is Senator Canavan getting out of his continual advocacy in this place for the Adani project?