Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I begin by acknowledging that we meet on the land of the Ngunawal and Ngambri peoples, land that was never ceded. I pay my respect to their elders, past, present and emerging. I also pay tribute to Minister Wyatt, Ms Burney, Senator Dodson, Senator McCarthy, Senator Lambie and Senator Thorpe. I'm privileged to count Linda, Pat and Malarndirri as friends and to have learnt so much from them.

Over the past month, our nation has celebrated the talent, hard work, integrity and achievements of Australian athletes. Few have inspired us more than Ash Barty winning Wimbledon and a bronze medal in Tokyo, and Patty Mills leading the Boomers to Australia's first-ever Olympic men's basketball medal. Their pride as representatives of Australia is as obvious as their pride in their Aboriginal heritage. There is their sporting heritage, their stated love and respect for Evonne Goolagong Cawley and Cathy Freeman, and their cultural heritage as traditional custodians of the land we now call Australia, inheritors of the oldest continuing civilisation on earth, being proud of who they are, claiming their space and not seeking to accommodate anyone's discomfort. I make these observations not to pretend sport can close the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. It can't. And we need to be careful in thinking sport can overcome racism on its own, just as we need to be careful not to promote an expectation that, to be valued in our society, Indigenous Australians need to be Olympians. What then happens to the little Indigenous kid who isn't a star athlete? What happens when Indigenous athletes don't want to be boxed in and express views that some don't like?

But there is something happening in sport. We see athletes the world over taking the knee together, conveying to each other and their fans that black lives matter. People who might not have come together in other circumstances are finding themselves on the same team, relying on each other, each person engaging with an act of respect and in an act of leadership. Old expectations of racial solidarity would not have brooked that. The message many are sending is: we are a team, we stand together and an attack on one of us because of race is an attack on us all, on all of our shared humanity. We see it here in Australia in the respect and affection of the Boomers for their captain and in how the AFL is seeking to improve its response to acts of racism. It is heartbreaking and unacceptable that we see overt acts of racial abuse in Australian sport, just as it is heartbreaking and unacceptable that structural racism is still so persistent.

A critical part of overcoming racial abuse and structural racism is action. Just one example in my home town is that the former captain of the Adelaide Crows has been banned from playing for six games after making a racist slur against an Indigenous player from another club. This action could be taken because an Adelaide Crows official reported the comment. The chair of the Indigenous Players Alliance, Des Headland, said:

Previously there's been a lot said in club rooms and change rooms that gets swept under the carpet.

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In terms of the official, I take my hat off to them. That's leadership, that's courage. It's courageous for people to stand up and call this out.

It is an individual deciding to take the risk of standing up against racial abuse and the team and the code backing that individual—something we didn't see enough of when Nicky Winmar was abused by players, media and fans and something we didn't see enough of when Adam Goodes was booed out of football. We all could have and should have done more. It took years for the AFL to reflect on how Mr Goodes was treated and to offer an apology.

In a speech about Closing the Gap, why do I bring this up? It's because, at its core, Closing the Gap is about leadership, here and beyond. It's about courage. It's about each of us deciding to do what we can. It's about saying to leaders, 'We will not accept that our First Australians have dramatically fewer opportunities and consistently worse outcomes than other Australians.' It is about refusing to tolerate racial abuse or systemic racism. It is about those of us who are not First Nations people educating ourselves and not just relying on First Nations people to do the educating. It is about the leaders of our government looking within themselves and deciding they will no longer contribute to the stubborn gap, that they will actively work to overcome it. The gap between us cannot be sustained if we close the gap within us. Each of us can be leaders in our own families and communities, and we should act as though what we do makes a real difference—because it does. We should seek to find the common humanity in all of us and we should refuse to abide by any threats to that common humanity.

The national government has a particular responsibility to lead, and that leadership is lacking. For eight long years this government has shunted its responsibility for progress on Closing the Gap to states and territories, future parliaments and future generations. I wish on this that Mr Morrison would do what he so rarely does and actually take responsibility. There is no leadership without responsibility. It is more than two years since the government said it would change its approach to Closing the Gap and it's now reset most of the targets, effectively shifting the goalposts on prior failures. The next Closing the Gap statement will be a critical test.

For now, I offer these observations. Three targets—family violence, suicide and digital inclusion—do not have any comparison data for the non-Indigenous population. Even if the adult incarceration goal were to be met, the rate would still be more than 11 times higher than for non-Indigenous Australians. Even if the youth incarceration goal were to be met, the rate would be more than 12 times higher than for the non-Indigenous population. Only three targets out of 17 are on track: children born healthy and strong—that is, birthweight—preschool and youth detention. I will say, however, that Labor does welcome the establishment of a stolen generations compensation scheme. It was Labor that took reparations for the stolen generations to the last election, and we welcome the Morrison government coming on board with this. We will look very closely at its delivery.

Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd commenced the effort to close the gap as part of his Apology to the Stolen Generations. Labor now seeks to continue and expand on that tradition. Listening to and empowering First Nations people will be at the very core of Labor's approach to closing the gap and to reconciliation: delivering treaty and truth, fulfilling the promise of Uluru. The Uluru statement called for a national process of treaty and truth-telling overseen by a makarrata commission, along with a constitutionally enshrined voice to the parliament. Our party is committed to the Uluru statement in full. We are committed to a constitutionally enshrined voice to parliament and to establishing a makarrata commission as a matter of priority, because a clear and accurate telling of Australia's story is essential to reaching our full potential as a nation.

The disparity in First Nations employment outcomes is connected to other quality-of-life outcomes, such as health, education and housing. That is why we will strengthen economic and job opportunities for First Nations people and communities, including by scrapping the Community Development Program and developing a new remote jobs program in partnership with First Nations people and communities. A Labor government would get behind inclusive growth for Indigenous owned businesses, both domestically and internationally, and would reaffirm the importance of Indigenous rights and traditional knowledge in future international agreements.

Our First Nations peoples were the first traders on this land, they were the first exporters and they were the first diplomats, engaging with people from other lands. Should I have the honour of serving as foreign minister in an Albanese Labor government, this will be recognised at the heart of Australian diplomacy, as a matter of Australia's historical and future engagement with other peoples. Australia's diplomacy is a projection of our identity. It is a projection of our values as much as our interests. Our identity can only be complete when Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australia are reconciled. As my friend Senator Dodson says, that is the full expression of our nationhood and the Australia I want to project to the world.