Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have been agonising over whether or not to raise this issue on the national agenda. I just can't put it off any longer. The life expectancy of First Australians has slipped from 54 to 49, whilst the rest of us have a life expectancy of 82. I hope no-one will call this genocide, but you know this is going on and you do nothing about it. I have repeatedly raised this issue—not just myself but other people as well—and you do absolutely nothing about it. They can't grow their own fruit and vegetables, because you abolished their right to have backyard fruit and vegetable gardens in the Torres Strait, and they are not allowed to own land anywhere in the Aboriginal communities in northern Australia. I can't speak for the rest of Australia, but it's probably the same.

There are two million hectares in above-24-inch-rainfall areas supposedly owned by the First Australians, but you mob over there and you mob over here have said that it has to be owned by the tribe. Well, why don't we put that on you? Why don't we say, 'Oh, no, you can't own land here; you're Scottish, go back to Scotland'? (Time expired)

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