Page 1286 - Week 05 - Thursday, 4 June 2020
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ACT helps to determine how exactly to do this. First, the barriers to women’s participation in politics must be removed so that parliament is a more attractive workplace for women. This includes introducing family friendly working hours, maternity leave and breastfeeding facilities. Second, political parties must preselect more women. Third, women and men should be provided educational material on the benefits of electing women representatives. Finally, women must access leadership and senior portfolio positions in order to maximise their influence on policy outcomes for women—because women best represent women.
Again, this was not quite the internship that Miriam or I anticipated, but I commend her flexibility and commitment to the task and the rigour with which she has approached it.
Mr George Floyd
Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders—Reconciliation Week
MS STEPHEN-SMITH (Kurrajong—Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, Minister for Children, Youth and Families and Minister for Health) (5.24): I was going to rise in the adjournment debate this week to speak about Reconciliation Week, but with the events that are going on around the world, particularly in the United States—and now we are seeing protests in Australia as well—I want to touch briefly on the tragic death of George Floyd and the black lives matter movement. As members would be aware, I spent more than four years living in Washington DC and so it is a shock to see what is going on there at the moment. It is heartbreaking what is happening in the US right now.
George Floyd’s death was heartbreaking for his family and a tragedy for the community—killed for an alleged fake $20 note. It is symbolic of so much that African Americans have experienced over so long, but it is not surprising that the black lives matter movement is also coming to Australia and is in Australia and that people are out on the streets here, during and after Reconciliation Week. Aboriginal people are the most incarcerated people on earth, and this is a matter that we should all take incredibly seriously and rededicate ourselves to addressing in any way that we can.
The Uluru statement from the heart called for truth telling, and the truth is that more than 400 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have died in custody since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody in 1991. Tragically, this includes, of course, Canberrans. The unimaginable trauma felt by individuals and the wider community only adds to the cultural load experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. This trauma impacts all aspects of people’s lives—employment, education, health and wellbeing and, of course, as we discussed earlier in the debate, mental health.
Some have tried to brush away this anguish and anger felt by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people by saying that we should not import things that are happening overseas here to Australia, but the reason that people are on the streets is that this is a true experience and we do indeed, particularly in Reconciliation Week but all the time, need to speak the truth, not only of our history but of our present day.
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