Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too acknowledge the presence in the chamber of Sikyong Penpa Tsering and the delegation of the Tibetan community and from Tibet.

I want to thank Senator McKim for advancing this matter of public importance motion for debate in the chamber today, and I have to agree with everything in his statement. It says:

His Holiness the Dalai Lama is a leader of peace, compassion and non-violence in Australia and the world; the severe violations of religious freedom in Tibet and the policy of sinicising Tibetan culture and religion is concerning, and; decisions regarding the selection, education, and veneration of Tibetan Buddhist religious leaders are exclusively spiritual matters that should be made by the appropriate religious authorities within the Tibetan Buddhist tradition and in the context of the will of practitioners of Tibetan Buddhism.

That statement is wholly and completely acceptable to any person who believes in the fundamental human right of individuals to hold a faith and to gather together to honour and celebrate that faith.

It was only in recent days that I spoke in this chamber regarding the movement towards a referendum acknowledging support of all of the faiths, in public statements, for our movement towards that referendum and a voice for Aboriginal people in this country. They have suffered exactly the sort of situation described by Senator Reynolds: the loss of family connection, the removal of language capacity, the diminishing of an entire culture and abrogation of the sense of right to identity that, clearly, belongs to the Tibetan people.

I'm very pleased to say that in my time here in the parliament I had the opportunity, with others, to have an audience with his Holiness the Dalai Lama, and I cannot think of that encounter without smiling. I think the joy, the peace and the happiness that is manifest in the way his Holiness interacts with the world has been instructive for the cause of peace in our time. That is why it is very important that we continue to stand and speak, to this issue, in sites such as our parliament that are beacons of democracy.

I'm pleased to say that the Albanese government speaks clearly and consistently in support of human rights around the world. We bring all aspects of Australian power to our foreign policy, and we employ every strategy at our disposal towards upholding human rights, consistent with our values and with our interests. The Australian government has been very clear and consistent in raising serious concerns about human rights in Tibet, publicly and privately, directly with China and in multilateral forums. The foreign minister, Senator Penny Wong, has consistently raised Australian government concerns about the erosion of rights and freedom in Tibet with her counterpart in China, and she will continue to do so. On 1 March, the assistant foreign minister, Minister Watts, delivered Australia's national statement at the high-level segment of the 52nd session of the Human Rights Council, expressing Australia's concerns about reports of the erosion of educational, religious, cultural and linguistic rights and freedoms in Tibet.

The government is very concerned about and very aware of disturbing reports by UN experts about the separation of Tibetan children from families in government run boarding schools. On 6 February this year, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said the UN special rapporteurs had found one million Tibetan children separated from families in government run boarding schools, in a policy described by a term that's too familiar to Australians who study our own history—a policy of assimilation. We are gravely concerned also by reports of Tibetans being detained for peaceful expression of political views. The suppression of Tibetan religious expression, excessive security measures, mass surveillance, restrictions on travel and China's policies on Tibetan cultural rights and heritage are of concern, and they will continue to be of interest to the people of Australia.