Madeleine King (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I speak today to support the Constitution Alteration (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice) 2023. It is unequivocally a good thing and right that the Australian people will get the opportunity to vote in a referendum that will enable an important change to our Constitution that will recognise our First Nations peoples through a voice to the parliament.

Because of some sad and crushing personal circumstances, I might not be present to vote on this bill, but I want to put on the record of this parliament my wholehearted support for this important step in our nation's history, one that will take significant steps to right some wrongs of the past.

Recognising the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples of Australia in the Constitution, through the Voice to Parliament, will never make everything right, but it is a good start and a start we must make to reconcile us all with those dark and tragic parts of the history of this nation that sit alongside Australia's great achievements. Enshrining the Voice to Parliament will enable us to turn a corner and take up the generous offer of the Uluru Statement from the Heart to walk together in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.

Soon after I was elected to this place in July 2016, nearly seven years ago, I went to Bertram Primary School, in Kwinana in my electorate, to a school assembly. I'll be honest. Before I was elected, I didn't have a great deal to do with school assemblies and have not been to many, and they sure have changed since my last day at primary school—in 1982 or something. At this assembly, two Noongar students did an acknowledgement of Whadjuk country in their own language. It was beautiful.

While I've seen many acknowledgements of country and welcomes to country, it was a new experience for me to witness two young local Noongar kids recognising their own country in their own language. It was an acknowledgement of country that Bertram Primary School had been doing for some time and continues to do. I think about those two young students from time to time. This year they will probably be 18 years old—hopefully, in time to enrol in the referendum on the Voice. Recognising Australia's Indigenous peoples will be entirely natural for these young people and their peers, and I imagine many of the older teenagers across Rockingham and Kwinana in my seat of Brand will wonder why this took so long.

In 2018, in the 45th Parliament, I had the opportunity to witness one of the meetings of the Joint Select Committee on Constitutional Recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. It was before the Barunga Festival, where the committee met with the four Northern Territory land councils: the Anindilyakwa Land Council, the Central Land Council, the Northern Land Council and the Tiwi Land Council. The committee was co-chaired by Senator Pat Dodson and, of course, the member for Berowra, two keen and enthusiastic supporters of the Voice. The meeting was held under a large canopy in Barunga, about an hour's drive from Katherine in the Northern Territory. I had never imagined in my life that I would witness such a meeting of such remarkable people in such a place.

Together with my friend and colleague the member for Newcastle, now the Deputy Speaker, Sharon Claydon, I sat under this tent and watched and listened to the hearing for many hours. As we watched, the member for Newcastle asked me quietly, 'Where have you ever seen so many people deeply engaged in such a lengthy and detailed discussion about the Constitution?' It was a remarkable observation. Of course, I'd never seen such a sight. I've studied constitutional law, I've been a lawyer, I worked at a university for 10 years and I've been a parliamentarian for seven, and never in that time have I seen such an engaging discussion about the Constitution of this country—not in a lecture theatre and not in this parliament.

At Barunga, more than a hundred Indigenous Australians, organised in their land councils and various groupings, sat, listened and caucused on how they would speak to the committee that day. They talked about the points that needed to be made and what had been said and what had not yet been said. There was good humour, there was some harsh reality and there was thoughtful consideration of recognising Indigenous Australians in the Constitution by those who had themselves been seeking to be recognised and included since they were excluded in 1901.

All Indigenous communities face significant challenges. That is, of course, undeniable. Appalling inequality exists between remote communities and urban areas. But, as all those land councils know and as our Indigenous sisters and brothers know, you can fight battles on more than one front, and the people at Barunga who participated in the inquiry on that day know that. The First Nations gatherings from around the country that wrote the Uluru Statement from the Heart know that as well. Despite the challenges, our First Nations Australians argue for a better constitution and a better country. We need to listen, and we must listen. We must listen to what the Barunga Statement said 30 years ago, and we must listen to the more recent Uluru Statement from the Heart—both documents coming from the ground up, from Indigenous peoples themselves, from right around the country; both petitions presented to parliament. Enshrining a Voice to Parliament in the Constitution is our opportunity to act and listen and ensure that, quite simply, Indigenous Australians will have a recognised Voice and a say on matters that affect their lives.

In my first speech in this place, in October 2016, I made some observations that I'd like to repeat in this parliamentary debate:

Fear is a tremendous and dangerous weapon, and its use is as old as the hills of this, the oldest continent on the face of the earth.

In one of his many popular essays published in the West Australian in the late 1930s, Sir Walter Murdoch observed that we spend too much time:

… seeking for a continuing city … where it can never be found: in a fluid world.

He spoke about fear and considered it to be the case that:

… the fear we have to conquer if we seek wisdom—is the fear of change.

Sir Walter Murdoch was the founding professor of English literature at the University of Western Australia. He was a self-confessed conservative, and he lamented:

… I feel like kneeling down daily and praying to be delivered from this shameful fear of change, and praying that my country may be delivered from it.

He was reflecting that things must change and they should change and we should not be afraid of change.

I'm a bit more optimistic, perhaps, than Sir Walter in my language, and I know that Australians do embrace change. We have seen that. But it is a word of caution for some conservative forces that seek to use fear and misinformation in holding Australia back from doing what is right, and it is indeed the right thing to do to recognise Indigenous Australians in the Constitution through a Voice to this parliament. Voting 'yes' in the upcoming referendum on the Voice is not a revolution; it is a modest and respectful and meaningful change to our Constitution that will enable the First Nations people of Australia to have a say in the matters that affect them. After 65,000 years of their caring for this unique country, we should listen to and hear the voice of our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander sisters and brothers.

I very much look forward to engaging more with the Western Australian community and the people of Brand on this important moment for the nation. There is much to discuss. We have this chance to work together to achieve a positive change for Australia and all who have the enormous great fortune to live here.

See this speech in context