Marion Scrymgour (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It really is great to be back in this House again with old friends and a whole mob of new friends and colleagues. To the new members, listening to all the stories of your journeys here to this point in your life certainly fills one with hope and a lot of encouragement that this new parliament, with all of the new members on both sides, will continue to achieve really great things. I was reminded listening to a lot of those speeches how privileged we are to represent all Australians. Your stories have inspired me to keep fighting.

Representing Territorians, particularly in the seat of Lingiari, and fighting to deliver for them is what I love. I love the electorate of Lingiari, from Kaltukatjara, which is the Docker River, which is only 670 kilometres south-west of Alice Springs on the border of Western Australia, to Galiwinku, right up north in the Top End on Elcho Island—and let's not forget the magnificent Christmas and Cocos islands. To everyone in Lingiari, thank you for putting your trust in me again. It is a privilege to represent such a vibrant and diverse community.

Lingiari is a vast electorate, as I have pointed out previously, and a massive logistical challenge to travel around. In this last campaign, we spent countless hours in four-wheel drives, in planes and even on forklifts, and we did an incredible job. I want to acknowledge the incredible team that I had around me. We had in Lingiari, at the last federal election, 197 individual election booths scattered around my 1.35-plus-million square kilometres of electorate. We drove thousands of kilometres on dusty, sandy roads and flew in plenty of tiny little planes to reach all corners of the electorate to ensure every Territorian in Lingiari had the opportunity to voice their opinion and cast their vote—and they did. Lingiari voted resoundingly for a strong, stable government and decidedly against the divisive culture wars that were stirred up by the opposition at the time.

The Territory doesn't have a huge population, despite its size, so during elections we usually know most of the volunteers from both sides at the booths. So this time it was really interesting to see the Country Liberal Party add a whole lot of new people, donning orange shirts and swarming and manning the voting booths. I note there were reports that those shirts were sometimes swapped out for orange One Nation shirts, which is very interesting to me. These groups of CLP volunteers, mostly men, whom we'd never seen before were very aggressive, often trying to intimidate women and bully a lot of our volunteers. They played grubby politics. We heard them lying to voters about my background. I found it quite funny, in particular on the Tiwi Islands, when I went home. For the record, I want to say that I'm not from Cairns; I'm a born and raised Territorian. But it was quite funny to hear the Liberal volunteers trying to tell my people that I wasn't really a Tiwi person but that I was from Cairns.

The way these people behaved at the voting booths was appalling. They were bullying volunteers, forcing them to leave the booths, but there was intimidation of female voters, and it was the first time I'd seen that. In 2022, I think the campaign was good on both sides, but this time there was a different level of bullying, in particular when it came to the intimidation of women voters in an attempt to make them vote their way. It simply wasn't accepted by a lot of the voters in some of the areas. The grubby tactics that they used didn't make a difference. In fact, a lot of voters saw straight through them. The results in Alice Springs in particular surprised a lot of people, I think.

Territorians know me. They know where I'm from and they know what I stand for, and this is reflected in the numbers. As I said earlier, they voted resoundingly for a strong, stable Labor government and a member who will stand up for them. It is important to see the changes in Alice Springs, and there has been huge investment by this federal Labor government into Alice Springs. We have had our problems in Alice Springs, like a lot of the small towns across Australia, but the people of Alice Springs recognise the tremendous investment that the Albanese government has put into their town, and they voiced this with their vote. Our government had a good story to tell. People know we're in safe hands with the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese. We still have challenges and a lot of work to do, but under our government I am confident that we can get it done.

I was honoured after the election to be appointed the Special Envoy for Remote Communities. The creation of this role is a testament to this government's commitment to remote communities right across Australia and to the Territory as a whole. I'm also very proud to have been selected on the Speaker's panel of the House. Being the first Aboriginal person ever to take the chair is a huge honour, and I thank Mr Speaker. In particular, I want to acknowledge the Deputy Speaker, the member for Newcastle, for all of the support that she gave me not only when I first came into this House but also as a mentor and a friend. I acknowledge and thank both the Speaker and the member for Newcastle, the Deputy Speaker. The night of the referendum was just so devastating to us. There have been many tears. Going around the communities and talking to many Aboriginal people right across the Northern Territory, the thought was that Australia had rejected our people. People felt that. But the election result showed the kindness in this country. What I got in particular from a lot of the communities in Lingiari was that they wanted me to express gratitude to all Australians for the last federal election and the vote. People felt that Australians had voted against division—that they no longer wanted division in this country but that they wanted everyone to come together and work to address a lot of the challenges that we've got. I know that we can take this country to a better place, and we're already well on our way.

I am looking forward to working with the Speaker of the parliament to continue his school civics program. Recently I spent a week on Christmas Island and went to the school there to talk to students about the civics program, and a lot of those young people had come to Canberra to have a look. Hopefully we can take the school civics program to Christmas Island, which I think would be a great place to go to. It is a particularly important program for all students in Lingiari, to show them the importance of democracy and voting and to show them what they can achieve. Whilst we saw a small improvement in the percentage of voters that voted in Lingiari in this election compared to the 2022 election, we still saw low voter numbers, particularly amongst our youth across Lingiari. My team and I have started focusing on how we need to target and work with young people to start getting them engaged in our democracy. We need to get them to see that voting is an important part of this place that we call Australia and that it's also important in the Northern Territory. So I will certainly work with the Speaker to look at the school civics program.

I was pleased to be appointed chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Northern Australia. I've lived my whole life in northern Australia, and it is a wonderful, unique, strong place. We need to encourage our young people living in remote communities to be role models and provide education and opportunity for them. This message is critically important. Whether it's through jobs, housing, economic empowerment or food prices, we want to build a stronger future. During the last term of government, and particularly during the last election campaign, we were able to deliver some hope and trust to Territorians by announcing the cheaper groceries program and programs to create 3,000 jobs, as well as building more than 2,700 more houses in the Territory. These programs will activate remote communities, provide education and job opportunities and empower our people.

Food security for remote communities is of critical importance. The Albanese Labor government has released a 10-year national strategy to improve food security in remote communities. This national strategy is aimed at improving access to affordable and nutritious food, regardless of where people live. Reducing the cost of 30 essential products—we're talking about 160 items in more than 76 remote stores—went a long way in helping to ease cost-of-living pressures and improve food security in remote communities. Building a nutrition workforce in these communities by upskilling up to 120 local First Nations staff in remote stores is crucial not only to improve nutrition but to create jobs for locals. That helps the local economies in these communities and, more importantly, allows locals to stay with families, to live and work in their own communities.

We took a commitment to the 2022 election to reform the abysmal CDP. This policy had abjectly failed remote Australia. When we told people out bush that we would be working to replace this program, there was visible relief. We are well under way on delivering this commitment, and while we have a lot of work to do, we have a strong commitment to this. The first stage of the Remote Jobs and Economic Development Project, or RJED, will create 3,000 new jobs in critical community-led sectors. I'm encouraged that 1,450 of these jobs have already been rolled out, and I'm very eager to work with the community on the remaining rollout. These jobs are absolutely transformative, and they will have a wide reaching impact. They will be driven by local businesses, local organisations and local people. These jobs will bring more money into families and develop skills, which will serve these workers throughout their life.

On housing, I'll be working with the Minister for Indigenous Australians and the broader ministry to make sure that this program and the $4 billion national partnership agreement will address critical housing shortages out bush. We aim to build 270 homes in remote communities per year over the next decade, as well as providing much-needed upgrades and repairs to current housing stock. I look forward to working with the minister and the Northern Territory government to ensure that these houses are delivered on time and in full. I'm delighted to be able to announce all these programs with my friend and co-star of the Mal and Mim show, Senator Malarndirri McCarthy, Minister for Indigenous Australians. I think a few of you may have seen our videos on social media. We had a great time together on the campaign driving tractors and forklifts, handling buffaloes and baby crocodiles but all the while delivering really important messages. Thank you, Senator McCarthy, for your support throughout during the campaign and over the years and for your ongoing friendship.

I also want to thank some of the volunteers on my campaign. To the Central Australian team of Lachie, Andrea. Matt, Scott, Kathy, Chansey, Mark, Sheralee, John, Mark Stoyles, Ali, Amy, Hayesy and, of course, my old friend Warren Snowdon: thank you all for travelling out to communities in remote central Australia and for holding the fort in Alice Springs. To Vince and to Haji Adams on Cocos Island: thank you. To Gordon, Zoey, Sukia and the whole team on Christmas Island: I thank you. It's a magnificent and important part of my electorate and of Australia.

In Katherine, I thank Reuben, Mike, Jessie, Nick, Jo, Tristan, Mick Uibo, and, of course, Selina Uibo—the fantastic Labor Leader of the Opposition in the Northern Territory. She and her team are doing an incredible job up against a very divisive and uneducated CLP government. Thanks go to Kay, Len, Sid and all the Tennant Creek and Barkly team. In Nhulunbuy, we had Denise, Rachel and Syd Stirling, Sharna Edwards and Ursula, and Gillian and Lynne and some of the families over on Galiwinku.

Helping out across the Arafura Sea, thanks go to Ebony, Maina, Manuel, Gawin, Edwina, Nathan, Karlene, Kesara, Wesley and other family members. Over in Wadeye and the Daly region we had Dheran, Birrigan and Anthony. Labor legend Kerry Gardiner and Sean were out in Elliot, Marlinja, Lingara and Yaralin. I will provide all of these names to the office.

To Team Senator McCarthy: they always provide great support, and during the campaigns it was no different. They all took leave and were all over Lingiari and Solomon for the member for Solomon and me and provided my office with tremendous assistance. In particular, I have to thank Sharna Edwards, who was an excellent support to my campaign manager, Anna. Thanks to Shlok Sharma and Ella Shaw, who provided overarching support to my campaign. Ella came up to the Territory for a couple of months. Thank you to Ella and to Shlok, who always gives his life to the party at every federal election, territory election, by-election, council election. He has an incredible amount of knowledge and love for the fight as much as I do.

To my union comrades at the United Workers Union, Erina Early, Joel Bowden and all of the NT unions: I thank you for your support. The United Workers Union was out in force in Gunbalanya, Ali Curung, Batchelor and all different parts of the electorate. To Mae Mae Morrison, Alan Sagiba and Peter Wellings: I thank you. To the CPSU and Mitch in Alice Springs: I thank you for providing your support. Lucas was very helpful in the Top End rural area, along with Rob, Dennis, Cecily, Kirsty and Amber.

Just before I'm ready to finish off, I do want to pick up something in the one minute I have left. I started talking about what I thought was different about this election. What was different was the 40 people from the Exclusive Brethren who were flown into parts of my electorate. I think it was quite frightening to see the way in which these people acted—the bullying and intimidation. I had not seen them before. There have been some complaints to the Electoral Commission in terms of some of the behaviour. It was interesting to see one jet in particular that was flying these 40 members to some particularly remote areas across Lingiari. It would be interesting to find out who was the owner of that jet that flew the Brethren particularly into parts of Lingiari because the CLP didn't have the manpower. Certainly, with a lot of these men—and they were exclusively men who were flown into some parts of the electorate—their intimidation and manhandling in some cases, in the way in which they pushed up against Aboriginal women, was quite disgraceful.

See this speech in context