Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Dodson, for this question, on what is your last day in the Senate. It is a question that goes to Senator Dodson's life's work. For many Australians, Senator Dodson is the father of reconciliation. I know that the disappointment he felt, that we share, about the referendum was profound. I ask all of us to reflect on his words yesterday about the result. He said:

That 60-40 spread of that vote makes it an Australian problem. It's not an Aboriginal problem …

We need to seriously think now of the way in which our civil society knits together with this diversity and differences.

'Knits together.' So this cannot be the end.

I say to senators: this is not something we need to think about only from the point of view of closing the gap, as important as it is. This is something we need to think about in terms of healing our nation. This is about the country we choose to be. Will we allow history to entrench difference and disadvantage? Or will we decide to build a future that unites, which is what Senator Dodson has been seeking all his life?

I know we are all saddened that Senator Dodson leaves this place when there is still so much to be done, but I would say to all of us that it is our job to continue his legacy and to continue the task he set out in his first speech:

If we work to find what we have in common rather than what divides us, I believe that we can be better people; we can build a better Australia; we can build a better place for the next generation together.