Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

As the Greens leader in the Senate I pay respects to the First Nations owners of this land, over which sovereignty was never ceded. So it is, it was and it will always be Aboriginal land. I acknowledge and pay respect to all First Nations members of this parliament.

I rise to take note of the deeply disappointing results of the annual Closing the gap report. We are not closing the gap anywhere near fast enough, and on many indicators have, shamefully, gone backwards. We know and acknowledge that the injustices we see documented in the Closing the gap report are symptoms of colonisation. First Nations people are wearing the consequences of racist decisions that successive governments in this country have made. It is on all Australians, but especially those of us in this chamber, to right the wrongs that started with invasion and the absence of treaty, and continue through child removal, incarceration and suicide. The rate of First Nations child removal is at an all-time high. Survivors of the Stolen Generations are now witnessing a new generation of First Nations children being stolen from their families and communities. The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide defines forcibly transferring children of one group to another group as an act of genocide. Implementing the recommendations from the Bringing them home report will keep First Nations kids with First Nations families. These are self-determined solutions that successive governments have ignored for 25 years.

Aggressive policing results in too many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people being locked up in prisons who do not have independent oversight to safeguard their human rights. Systemic racism in our policing and legal system is compounded by the low age of criminal responsibility, exposing kids as young as 10 to the trauma of prison and a criminal record. Sixty-five per cent of children in prison across Australia are First Nations kids. Our minimum age of criminal responsibility is out of line with international jurisdictions and out of line with our human rights obligations. We must urgently raise the age to at least 14 years.

Around 40 per cent of the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody are about social factors—things like education, health and housing. Access to basic human rights will stop First Nations people from going to prison in the first place. Successive governments have ignored this advice for 31 years. If the Albanese government are committed to hearing and acting on advice from First Nations people they will implement all the recommendations from the Bringing them home report and the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody and listen to calls from the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child to raise the age of criminal responsibility. This is urgent, and it's overdue.

First Nations people are resorting to self-harm, because they cannot see a future for themselves in this system. The continuing high rate of suicide shows that structural racism and the policies made for First Nations people but not by them is killing First Nations people. Often they don't have access to their land, water or sacred sites or even their own children. This is up to us to change. We've inherited a centuries-old regime written entirely by white men that has not undertaken any fundamental change since colonisation. We know the confronting truth: the basis of the Australian nation was terra nullius and the idea that First Nations people didn't need human rights or decision-making power because they were subhuman.

We have an opportunity to do things differently in this country. A national grassroots treaty process will close the gap by restoring First Nations people's rights to make decisions for themselves. We know that self-determined solutions work, because Aboriginal people know what's best for Aboriginal communities. Everyone thrives when they are free to set their own course. On this, there must be a standalone national plan to end violence against First Nations women and children that is developed, delivered and evaluated by First Nations women and community controlled organisations. I'm pleased that work on this has begun. Adequate funding must be allocated to get it done.

Despite ongoing injustice, First Nations people are strong and capable. A national treaty process puts First Nations people in the driver's seat when it comes to making decisions about their own country, community and culture. We are one of the only Commonwealth countries that doesn't have a treaty with First Nations people. It was promised by Bob Hawke's Labor government in the eighties. First Nations elders and activists have marched for it for decades. In this term of government the Greens will work for progress on truth, treaty and voice to meaningfully close the gap.