David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A letter has been received from Senator Hanson:

Pursuant to standing order 75, I propose that the following matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion:

With the overwhelming vote against the voice to Parliament, Australians have stated they don't want division; welcome to country ceremonies and acknowledgements of country are divisive, denying the citizenship and sovereignty held by all Australians regardless of race, and should be abandoned in Australian parliaments, council chambers and from any official government proceedings.

Is the proposal supported? It is supported. Senator McKim?

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have points of order on two issues, Mr Acting Deputy President. Firstly, I saw only four people rise to their feet, not five, so I seek your advice on that. Secondly, I ask for clarification, given that Senator Hanson has had the call withdrawn from her, as to whether she is still able to be counted as one of the people supporting this motion.

David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My understanding is that, as the signer of the letter, she is not counted. And there were five people standing.

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On a further point of order, then: in that case there were certainly not five people standing, because she was one of the people standing.

David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McKim, there were people standing at this end of the chamber.

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, they weren't.

David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McKim, I'm in the chair, and my role is to look and see people who were standing—making eye contact, making it clear—and my judgement was that there were the correct number of people standing for the motion to be supported. I will take the advice of the clerk as to whether the prohibition on Senator Hanson having the call to speak impacts her ability to lodge an MPI, but then, assuming it goes ahead, I will give the call to Senator Roberts. I'll take that advice now. Senator Roberts, you have the call.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As a servant to the great state of Queensland and Australia, I stand to speak to this matter and to again congratulate the Australian people on their overwhelming rejection of the divisive Voice to Parliament at the October referendum. It was more than a rejection of the Albanese Voice referendum. It was a rejection of the entire Uluru statement—all 26 pages of it. It was a rejection of a treaty and so-called truth-telling—or, more accurately, a rewrite of history with an eye on financial settlements funded by non-Indigenous taxpayers. It was a rejection of identity politics, grievance politics, virtue signalling and the activist cult of victimhood. Primarily, it was a rejection of racial division.

One of the most racially divisive features of modern discourse in Australia is welcome to country ceremonies, along with acknowledgements of country. Australians, including many Indigenous people, are sick and tired of them. We've had a gutful. People are sick of being told Australia is not their country, which is what these things effectively do. Supposed welcomes and acknowledgements deny the citizenship and sovereignty held equally by all Australians. They perpetuate the falsehood that nations existed on this continent prior to 1788. They didn't. This is a foreign notion, an activist device imported from Canada that does not reflect the reality of Australian history. The High Court confirmed that with a similar statement in 2020.

I remind the Senate of the promise made by leading Voice campaigner Marcia Langton: no more welcomes to country if the Voice was rejected. We can only hope this promise is lived up to. Federal taxpayers forked out at least $45,000 for these rituals in the previous financial year, although I understand the figure could be much higher, as not every government department has come clean on what they spend. It's not even a pre-settlement ritual for most Aborigines. It was invented in 1976 by Ernie Dingo and Richard Walley. I acknowledge Narungga elder Kerry White, from South Australia, a great contributor to the 'no' campaign, who said these rituals are not even being used correctly. She said last year that they should be reserved for Indigenous people welcoming other Indigenous people to local country and that their use by non-Indigenous Australians was just virtue signalling. She wasn't wrong about the virtual signalling, that's for sure. Ms White said:

… they've taken our ceremonial process and demeaned it by throwing it out there every day in every aspect of what Australian people do. And I think that is culturally wrong.

That was an Aboriginal woman saying that. She even said welcomes to country were an attack on Indigenous culture and disrespectful of Aboriginals and their culture, and that it was patronising and paternalistic to adopt them without understanding them. People saying this do not even understand what it means.

I also acknowledge another Indigenous leader of the 'no' campaign, Senator Nampijinpa Price, who said recently that welcomes to country were 'definitely divisive'. Those are her words: 'definitely divisive'. I'm confident there's a complete lack of care and a contempt for Aboriginals. People are too lazy to bother to listen and understand the needs of Aboriginals. That has to set back the Aboriginal movement. I am confident I speak for the majority of Australians in saying I wish Professor Langton had included acknowledgements of country too. They're recited at the beginning of every parliamentary sitting, every council meeting and every Zoom meeting held by public servants. We hear them at the conclusion of every domestic flight. You can hear the groans in the cabin every time. They have effectively lost all meaning for their constant repetition. At a conference in Mackay, an interstate speaker stood up and said a welcome to country for the people in Canberra because she came from Canberra and a welcome to country for the people in Mackay.

To foster national unity and to help put an end to racial division in this country, it's time to leave Aboriginal rituals to Aboriginal Australians. One Nation is supremely confident we speak for the majority of all Australians, regardless of race, when we call for an end to welcomes to and acknowledgements of country. We know that, for many, the promise of an end to them motivated their vote in the Voice referendum. We call on this parliament, all other Australian parliaments, all government departments and every local government in this nation to stop signalling the virtues you don't possess and stop dividing this country by abusing these Aboriginal rituals. Start showing respect for the Aboriginal culture in Australia. Australians don't want this virtue signalling. Australians don't want racial division. They said that most emphatically on 14 October at the referendum. Let's move forward together under one flag as one people in one nation.

Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

[Yanyuwa language not transcribed]. Thank you for enabling me to speak in my language, the language of the Yanyuwa people, which is one of hundreds of First Nations languages in this country. What I said was to acknowledge that I am a Yanyuwa woman. I am of the li-antha wirriyarra, which is the sea country people of the north, and from Borroloola, and I pay my respects to all present.

I am absolutely appalled by the motion brought forward by One Nation. It is beneath this Senate to even begin to bring in other aspects of the referendum. Let me remind One Nation what the question was. It was:

A Proposed Law: to alter the Constitution to recognise the First Peoples of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.

Do you approve this proposed alteration?

Let me remind the Senate that that was the question to all Australians. There was no question around welcome to country ceremonies. There were no questions, despite what this matter that One Nation has brought forward claims, of division or race. There was no question around sovereignty. I have read to the Senate and reminded the Senate what 17 million Australians went to the polling booths to do. What is happening here today is disgraceful.

Over six million Australians supported the question. It was not enough to get the question over the line in the Constitution. Nine million Australians said no. Look at the difference in that. They spoke about a voice to parliament not being enshrined in the Constitution. That did not diminish the need for Closing the Gap to improve the lives of First Nations people. It did not say: 'Remove the languages, remove the culture and remove the kinship of families in this country—of First Nations people.' It did not ask that of Australians. It's an absolute disgrace from One Nation, but then they do have form, don't they? They bring division, even into this Senate. In 2017, when Senator Hanson walked in here with a burqa, it was an absolute disgrace. They're always bringing in stunts, always wanting—

David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McCarthy, personal reflections are disorderly under standing order 193. I ask you to withdraw that and then continue.

Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Acting Deputy President Fawcett, when Senator Hanson wore a burqa into the Senate, it was certainly not in the standing orders to do so, and we said so at the time. In fact—

David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McCarthy, I have asked you to withdraw that imputation. I would ask you just to withdraw, and then you will have the call to continue.

Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will do so in the interests of moving forward, but I would kindly remind senators to have a lot at 2017. We've seen times here when there has been a constant need to completely divide this Senate. We've certainly heard that, even in discussions today. So I would say to Australians listening that this matter before the Senate is absolute rubbish. It's a disgrace. It's beneath the Senate to even have this discussion here this afternoon. It shows a complete disregard for the First Nations people in this country, who've been here for over 65,000 years.

Like it or not, we are not going away. If anything, those voices will be even louder. I'm just reminding all senators, and I thank the millions of Australians who came out in support. I thank my colleagues who came out in support. I thank the Greens. I certainly thank those in the other house who came out in support.

It was a very simple request by First Nations people who gathered on Anangu country just asking to be heard. And guess who's the most disappointed in this? It's the three per cent that it impacted in this country. The other 97 per cent in this country can move on and get on with their lives. But for that three per cent the hurt is really deep. But guess what? First Nations people have been disappointed before, and we keep coming back.

I remind the Senate: please, all of you, all senators, let's watch out for the language that we use. One Nation, you won the referendum. Did you really need to bring this on?

David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McCarthy, please address your remarks through the chair.

Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President.

Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this matter of public importance that has been brought before the Senate by Senator Hanson and One Nation. It's obviously entirely Senator McCarthy's absolute right to come in here and say what she has said. She says that she's appalled and disgraced by this motion, and she's outlined her reasons for that. But I do disagree on one point.

A government senator: Now there's a but!

No. With respect, I'd like to be heard in silence. I think it is important that we are able to have debates in this place in, of course, a respectful way, a way that doesn't demean the significance of the issue. As someone who has spent a lot of my career working alongside Aboriginal people, particularly in Western Australia, helping them to improve their lives and to see transformation across the community, I've seen an erosion of the significance of the welcome to country and the acknowledgement of country because of their overuse. I'm not the only person who would say this. In fact, throughout the debate about the Voice, Noel Pearson said that there actually does need to be a discussion about their use, so I think it is entirely appropriate that we come in here and have a discussion about their use. There does need to be some discussion. My view is that it is overused. There may be a place for them at significant events. When you go to a citizenship ceremony and there's a welcome to country or an acknowledgement of country, I think that's an entirely appropriate sort of place—

David Fawcett (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Cox, you are well aware of the standing orders. Senators are entitled to be heard in silence. The reason we have a chamber like this is so that people within Australia who have different views can be heard in silence, which is showing respect to the diversity of views. You expect to be heard in silence. I'd request that you respect the standing orders.

Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Of course, we don't all have to agree. It's my view that we should be able to have a discussion about this, because I think it's undermining.

I want to tell a very short story. My son is 15 years of age. When he was about seven years of age, we were in Brisbane together. We were over there for holidays, and I took him along to a NAIDOC event at Musgrave Park. As we were walking towards the park—from the centre of town it's probably a good 20- or 25-minute walk—my son said to me, 'Dad, I wish I was Aboriginal.' I said to him: 'Why is that, mate? Why do you say that?' He said: 'How cool would it be to have been here for that long—the very first Australians!' I thought of that saying, 'Out of the mouth of babes.' Here is a young boy, who I've tried to raise to respect our culture and to respect the history of this nation. Without me putting that in his head, he has acknowledged the significance of the role that Aboriginal people have played in the history of this country. I said to him: 'Son, that is your history, too. You are Australian. You should be proud, as you are, of the aspects of the culture of this nation.'

I think it is right that we have a debate about these sorts of things. It's important that we don't create an environment in this country where some Australians are deriding the importance of acknowledging our long culture and history, which Indigenous people have and bring into this place. This is something that we can all share in, that we can all play a part in. As I said, I think there is an overuse of the acknowledgements. When you go into a videoconference, you've got seven or eight people from around the country and each of them feels like they have to do the acknowledgement of the place where they are. It takes a big part out of the meeting. That was the point that Noel Pearson was making only a few weeks ago, when he was talking about the fact that it can interrupt. We should be able to recognise the significance of Aboriginal people and their history and the role their ancestors have played in caring for this country, but we shouldn't do it in a way that derides it.

Dorinda Cox (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

[Noongar language] Nih, ng-ung karn-arn, ka-ya-koorl Ngunnawal wer Ngambri boodja wer ng-ung waan-gk—kaya ng-ung moort, koor-a boordiya moort, yey boor-diya moort wer yirra koor-liny boor-diya moort. I want to acknowledge and pay my respects to the stolen lands, on which we meet today, that belong to the Ngunnawal and Ngambri peoples of this area. I pay my respects to their elders, past and present, and I want to acknowledge their emerging leaders, who we nurture, love and support, for the future generations who will continue our legacies.

I rise to completely and wholeheartedly reject this motion and the foul hatred that sits at the core of it. Even after my relatively short time in this place, I'm not at all surprised to see One Nation putting forward this racially divisive garbage. Need I remind this place that you are all here on stolen land? This land was taken by force, brutal violence and dispossession. That's written into our history, and it's the reason why we all stand every morning in this place to acknowledge country before we start the day. And it is the respectful thing to do when you are entering a place that is not yours. You don't walk into somebody else's house without being welcomed in—in fact, to do so is a crime, so maybe this is in fact a crime scene. It is a sign of respect to the rightful custodians of this country, something that I think a lot of people in this place could learn a thing or two about.

A lot of people were saying that the racist lies that the 'no' campaign was spewing would embolden people right across the country, and this is exactly what we are seeing. This motion is a prime example, and unfortunately we had another example in this place earlier today.

Another example I want to share happened back in my home state of Western Australia where the Boyup Brook shire council has, shamefully, rejected a proposal to have the Blackwood River referred to by its traditional name. My grandmother was born on the banks of this river, and it holds deep significance for the First Peoples of this area. Dual naming doesn't take away anything from anybody; it only adds knowledge and recognition of those who came before us. It has been done in many other countries across the world, including New Zealand and Ireland. At a City of Bunbury council meeting, they had a debate recently about updating their welcome and acknowledgement statements, in which one councillor said it would take away their freedoms and another said they didn't want to recognise it for those who weren't pure in soul and heart. Go and take a look at some of the comments on social media posts of prominent black advocates, and come back and tell me that we are the divisive ones in this country. If you don't respect us, just say so. Own it. Let the Australian people see who you really are, but don't you dare stand in here and try and tell me that a cultural practice that First Peoples have been honouring for tens of thousands of years is a problem here.

This is precisely why we need truth-telling processes in this country. Everyone in this country needs to know what this country was built on—the attempted genocide, the frontier wars and the massacres. And make no mistake: this did not stop at 1901. We have seen the dispossession and the oppression continue to this day, with the stolen generations, the Northern Territory Intervention, and the destruction of our cultural heritage and our sacred sites, just to name a few. An acknowledgement of country is the least that people can do. It's like walking into a room and acknowledging people who are already there. Not to do this is just damned ignorance. Time and time again, First Nations people have been knocked down. Time and time again, we've picked ourselves up, and we continue to fight for our rights in this country. That is what we have to do. We simply have no other option. This motion is in fact just another weak attempt to try and lay the boots into blackfellas, post this referendum.

I tell you what: we ain't laying down any time soon. Like our ancestors, we will keep fighting and we will keep rising up. Our sovereignty has never been ceded. We are still here despite the best efforts of successive governments. Terra nullius has been overthrown. Eddie Mabo fought hard to make sure of this, and he took it to the highest court in this country. The Western legal system has been unable to understand that we have been here for tens of thousands of years and to acknowledge the connections that we have to the lands, waters and skies that make up the place we now know as Australia. I will not let this hard work and the hard work of so many First Nations people across this country who fight for our rights, our land, our waters and our culture be overshadowed by the continual narrative to destroy our natural resistance. (Time expired)

Ralph Babet (Victoria, United Australia Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in support of Senator Hanson's matter of public importance. As a proud Australian, just like Senator Hanson, I believe that we should do all that we can to unite our beautiful nation. I love Australia, and I will proudly fight to preserve my home for future generations. On 14 October, what happened? The Australian people overwhelmingly voted to reject the government's plan to permanently enshrine an Indigenous Voice to Parliament within our Constitution. Every single state resoundingly voted no against this proposal. But senators would be mistaken if they think that this was merely a vote against constitutional change. It was more than that. This was a vote against racial division. This was a wholesale rejection of continuous efforts to divide Australians by race. On 14 October, Australians got to say, in the privacy of a ballot box, what they unfortunately dare not say in public because of fear of far-left, Marxist extremists.

It's true that Australians sit politely through welcome to country ceremonies, but I'm sure everybody is thinking the same thing: why are we being welcomed to our own home? It is as nonsensical as it is insulting. We privately mock public officials who get up one after the other in a conga line of political correctness, trotting out the acknowledgement of country. 'Elders past and present'—what does that even mean?

No-one even knows who they are. Not even the person regurgitating the acknowledgement knows who they are. Half the time, there aren't even any Indigenous people in the room—elders or otherwise. And what if there were? Are we really wanting a country where your family lineage rather than your individual achievements establishes your importance? Is that the sort of society that we all want?

My favourite part of the acknowledgement of country is the salute to elders emerging. What does that even mean? I'm not trying to make fun of Indigenous people. It's not me who's mocking them; it's the acknowledgement of country that mocks Indigenous people, because it insists that the most important thing about an Indigenous person is their skin colour rather than their character or their achievement. This is wrong. It's insulting to Indigenous people; it's insulting to non-Indigenous people.

On 14 October, more than 60 per cent of Australians said, 'Enough'—enough of being welcomed to the country in which many of us were born or now call home; enough of the acknowledgement of country as if we are hundreds of countries rather than just one, Australia; and enough of this divisive, pointless undermining of equality by insisting at the beginning of every government function that all Australians are equal, except that some, by virtue of race, are more equal than others. The people of Australia have sent a clear message to their political leaders—to us in this place. They don't want a nation divided by race. It's as simple as that. God knows, there is enough to divide people around the world right now without public officials coming up with new ways to separate rather than unite the nation. How foolish is it, then, for federal and state governments to continue these divisive rituals?

I support Senator Hanson's proposals for these ceremonies to be ditched—I do. In an increasingly fractured world, federal, state and local politicians should be looking for ways to unite this country. Federal and state politicians should be emphasising what we share in common rather than what makes us different. To begin every single public meeting by pointing to differences is not only contrary to the will of the Australian people but, I think, dangerous. A house divided will not stand. It's that simple. I call upon my colleagues in this place to stop dividing our nation. Our national anthem begins with this:

Australians all let us rejoice,

For we are one and free …

One—not many—and that's what I want for Australia. That is what we must all want and promote. God bless Australia!

David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I fear that at the core of this proposal is a deep insecurity about who we are as a country—an aversion to coming to terms with our past and being able to acknowledge the brutal dispossession of a land inhabited for 60,000-plus years by hundreds and hundreds of generations and the massacres that occurred that we do not talk about. Of course, you and I didn't do that. We weren't there, but we're here now, and we choose how to be part of a country that is grappling with its past, as we saw in the referendum.

There are First Nations people alive today who were ripped from their families and stopped from speaking their languages. An acknowledgement of country is a sign of respect to those people and to this continent's first people. As an immigrant—I've only been here 20 years or so—I think it is such an incredibly generous thing for First Nations people across the country, who have been subjected to what they have been, to still be willing to welcome gatherings and to bring their culture and say: 'This is all of our country. Welcome.'

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

The time for the discussion has expired.