Robert Oakeshott (Lyne, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Joint Select Committee on Constitutional Recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, I present the committee's advisory report on the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples Recognition Bill 2012 and I seek leave of the House to make a short statement in connection with the report.

Leave granted.

In accordance with standing order 39(f) the report was made a parliamentary paper.

This bipartisan act of parliament is progress. It is a baby step forward, but it is progress. It is not what was agreed at the start of this parliament, but it is progress. It is not what was promised by both major parties at the 2010 election, but, again, it is progress.

Despite this bipartisan act of parliament, the Australian Constitution remains a document written on the premise of race. It was written at a time when Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples were considered under law to be akin to flora and fauna. Key figures from the Constitution was written, such as Australia's first Prime Minister, Edmund Barton, who is immortalised in bronze in my home town of Port Macquarie for his Federation work, are quoted as saying that people of colour are an inferior people. This premise of inferiority of coloured people remains in law today. It remains in our lead document, and it is with sadness that I note that this Australian parliament still feels that we, as a nation, are not yet ready to remove it.

How section 25 could remain in law in Australia in 2013 is beyond me. It reflects on all of us as Australians that we have allowed this to happen and that we feel little need to count all humans, of all colours, for voting and population purposes. It reflects on my region that section 25 remains.

The Mid-North Coast has very large and proud Aboriginal communities—from Biripai country to Dhunghutti lands. Our history has been difficult post-European settlement, with books like Baal Belbora leaving any reader deeply troubled about our region's history of how first settlers and first peoples worked out—or, often, did not work out—issues of conflict.

This history should not mask the many positives at a regional level. Some of the most wonderful contributions to community building have come from local first peoples. The recent Saltwater Freshwater Festival in Taree on Australia Day showcased a lot of this history and a lot of this contribution, in a positive way, and I invite all who think about this topic to Kempsey in 2014 for this positive Australia Day event. It is just one example in a long and positive history of engagement that sits parallel to many difficult stories. When I attended the Saltwater Freshwater Festival this year, in the pouring rain, this section 25 sat in the back of my mind, and as I looked around I saw wonderful people doing wonderful things who still, under our lead document, could be discounted for voting or for population head counts. How could we, in Australia in 2013, allow this to remain?

At the most personal of levels, due to the sheer luck of cupid's arrow I have had the joy of marrying into a very proud Yow Yeh mob of South Sea islanders and Aboriginal Australians from Bahili lands. I feel deeply honoured to have married into such a rich history of Australia as well as to have married a beautiful woman and my best friend. It is an honour that comes with all the challenges of the Koori grapevine that is part of the package. I just cannot remove the personal from this issue, because this one is personal. It is personal for me, as I know it is personal for many others. I ask you all in this chamber—this chamber that is in danger of dragging its feet on this issue—how you can defend current Australian law that treats my children, my very Australian children, as inferior in law; I ask how you can defend current Australian law that treats my wife, my very Australian wife, as inferior in law; and I challenge you to defend current Australian law that says my extended family, my wildly Australian extended family, is somehow inferior in law. How dare the law say that.

So, while I am not opposed to this bipartisan act of parliament, I urge all MPs in political parties to keep their leadership honest and urgent on this matter. We have now established a two-year window to do something and fix our laws and make them fair for all. We would, once again, let down all Australians if we failed to grab this bipartisan opportunity that has now been created. I am not aware of one single MP or senator of any political persuasion who would, in 2013, agree with Australia's first Prime Minister that coloured people are an inferior race. I therefore cannot understand why getting the political parties in 2013 to agree on a detailed question to be put or a process that delivers on the obvious—the agreed and promised changes so necessary for the heart of our modern Australia—is like trying to herd cats.

It would be remiss of me not to acknowledge and pay respect to the mix of views that remain within Australian first peoples about this process of constitutional recognition. While my anecdotal evidence is that most are strongly supportive of steps taken, some are wary, some are weary, and some continue to hold out for more. All I can offer as one MP is that, from my personal stance, I remain engaged on all concerns about issues of sovereignty and concepts of treaty. I remain engaged on the reasons that constitutional recognition is important and the implications behind why it is important in moral and legal thinking, and I remain engaged in wanting to make sure we get this right.

Personally, and I emphasise this is very much a personal view, I do not think constitutional recognition is the end in itself; constitutional recognition is the means to the end. The Australian Constitution is, I hope we all agree, a living document, and reconciling the many wounds from a different time will take a long time and a lot of work. In that context, as hard and as challenging as constitutional recognition will be, it is from my perspective really just another important step. As 1967 was and as the 'sorry' speech was, this has the potential to be another step forward.

So the 43rd Parliament, with this proposed act of parliament, is starting to lay the foundation stones. We have done the funding for Reconciliation Australia for the Recognise campaign, which I hope most if not all MPs have now seen begin. The act of parliament starts to outline a process of progress, and we have at the least found the bipartisan boundary. Now, as we head to elections for the 44th Parliament, we need to find agreement from the major parties on the detailed question, we need to raise awareness in the community on the importance of this issue, and we need to do it all within the next two years. That is the great challenge of this parliament, and that is the great challenge for all Australians.

This matters—it matters a lot for the culture and the heart of a modern Australia. I hope that bipartisanship can reach across that table in the middle and make it happen, and I hope that the Australian community recognises that there is still a premise of race in the lead document of the laws of this land. It is time it changed.