Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

This motion from those opposite is nothing more than rank, smelly political opportunism. The motion that they have brought to the chamber today attacking the Commonwealth government for a policy position to implement in the future policies to protect Aboriginal heritage based on a scare campaign that those opposite have sought to amplify back in Western Australia is absolutely disgusting.

Let's go through some facts about the Western Australian changes. Before these new laws came into place, it was already unlawful to harm Aboriginal cultural heritage. That has not changed. What has to change is the upholding of that heritage.

You may well have a colonial house that has heritage values attached to it; that might well have some protection under laws that do not provide protection for Aboriginal culture and artifacts on smaller lots of land—smaller lots of land of less than 110 square metres. Think of it this way: colonial heritage has more protection on most lots of land in Western Australia than Indigenous heritage under this bill. In fact, the bill before the Western Australian parliament reduces the land that is governed by these Aboriginal protection laws.

Consultation on the act and the regulations took place over five years, with 1,100 people attending 90-plus workshops as part of the codesign process for the regulations. But here comes the cincher—after 220 submissions and hundreds of meetings: the National Farmers Federation and the pastoralists and graziers association were invited to attend these workshops, but they decided not to attend. I must say, one of their policy officers who came to the consultations said they thought the consultation process was exemplary.

In this context, Tony Buti, the minister in Western Australia, said: 'We've taken notice of the farmers and pastoralists who attended the workshops and give us their advice. The peak organisations may not have attended, or we were notified that they would not attend; however, we did listen to the farmers and pastoralists, and, as part of that feedback, we developed a tiered system that will allow for the better processing of applications for uses of land.'

As you well know—as you should know—pastoralists and farmers will not be impacted by most of this legislation. This is legislation that the state opposition did, in fact, vote for. So, while we are here today, you have called on me to not defend the state government, but the simple fact of the matter is I do. Sure, there are problems with the implementation, but the state opposition voted in favour of the legislation.

The federal opposition still has the gall to stand here and pretend that it stands up for Aboriginal heritage while it brings such motions to the floor. It is absolutely galling. When you contribute to undermining Aboriginal heritage protection by bringing debates like this to the chamber, you make it so much harder for people who are trying to stand up for their culture and their rights. So shame on you. Shame on those opposite for the motion that they've brought to the chamber here today.