Ms THEOPHANOUS (Northcote): My adjournment is to the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, and I ask the minister to join me in meeting with key Aboriginal organisations residing within the electorate of Northcote to discuss the government’s work towards treaty and its work to overcome the systemic and cultural barriers that continue to impact Aboriginal Victorians. I spoke recently with Esme Bamblett of the Aborigines Advancement League in Thornbury, which has long fought for racial justice and a better life for future generations of Aboriginal people.
We reflected on the global and local events that have led to the latest groundswell of change, and we spoke about the many people who have asked what they can do to lend their support to this movement and how we can collectively do better. Esme reminded me of the words of Tom Calma, a former Aboriginal social justice commissioner, who stated:
Indigenous peoples are not merely ‘disadvantaged citizens’. The poverty and inequality that they experience is a contemporary reflection of their historical treatment as peoples. The inequality in health status that they continue to experience can be linked to systemic discrimination.
She also reminded me of the mural on St Georges Road, an Aboriginal face looking to the future with hope. Above his head the justice scales are drawn. They hang with the question ‘Just this’ at one end or ‘Justice’ at the other.
Minister, there have been 432 deaths in custody since the 1991 Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. Aboriginal people are still disproportionately represented in the justice system, rates of unemployment, children in out-of-home care, chronic health conditions and life expectancy. Now more than ever I believe it is incumbent on all of us to reflect on our own understandings of race and privilege in modern Australia. It is important to understand that the journey to self-education and self-awareness is not always a smooth one, but that should not deter us.
We will make mistakes. We will have blind spots. They will be called out, as they should be, but we must exercise empathy towards each other in this process and we must persevere, because racism is an insidious burden, an elusive and corrosive weight placed on certain people to the benefit and profit of others. It should have no place in our society. Change is incremental, excruciatingly so for those of us who have been on the receiving end of racial discrimination.
With the leadership of First Nations people and the Premier, we are progressing towards treaty—treaty that puts Victoria out in front of the nation to enable a greater degree of self-determination that is backed by law and by funding. Treaty offers hope. Treaty offers an acknowledgement of past failings. Treaty offers a pathway to a shared future. Minister, I hope that you will join me in these important discussions with my community.
