Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Let me make it very clear to this House that this debate on the Native Title Amendment (Indigenous Land Use Agreements) Bill 2017 is about native title rights, not mining rights. Calls by the senator on the other side about ILUAs are completely false. The government claim that this bill must be passed this week to avoid legal calamities for existing ILUAs is totally unsound. Registered ILUAs remain valid unless successfully challenged in court. While there may be potential for some registered ILUAs to be challenged because they do not comply with the requirements of the law established in the McGlade decision, no such challenge has been mounted in the over three months since that decision.

There is no rush for this debate. This must be debated in a respectful manner. It is 25 years next month since the late Eddie Mabo fought for land rights, for native title rights, in this country. There has been absolutely no respect in this current process for the traditional owners of this country, for the Noongar people of WA or for native title holders across the country. You on the other side say that you have spoken to Indigenous leaders, but you did not get there without Senator Patrick Dodson. It is Labor who has had to drag you every step of the way to consult, to discuss and to work with native title holders across the country, and you still have not done that adequately. So we will not rush this bill; we will talk about it in the manner appropriate for examination by this house, and we will do that when we need to do that. Another thing is amendment after amendment has been put through by the other side at last-minute intervals, giving no time for people to inspect this in the Senate. The Greens stand up, with every right, in the Senate to say that they have not seen the Cape York Land Council amendments. We have not heard from other senators—