Dr WOODRUFF (Franklin – Leader of the Greens) – Honourable Speaker, I thank the honourable member for Braddon, Mr Garland, for bringing this really important motion on. On behalf of the Greens, I recognise that Tasmanian Aboriginal people are the traditional and original owners of all of Lutruwita/Tasmania’s lands, waters and sky country, and that we recognise their enduring spiritual, social, cultural and economic importance of those lands, waters and sky to Aboriginal people and their rights to be able to protect their heritage and have a say in what happens over their land and indeed to have land returned to Aboriginal Tasmanian Palawa/Pakana and that has not happened for decades now.
I acknowledge Cody Gangell, Ruth Langford and Nala Mansell and their ongoing championing of their community and the protection of Aboriginal heritage. I noticed when I was looking back at some notes for this speech that the Greens received a letter from Ruth Langford in 2013 about the revisions to the act that were occurring and she flagged then her concerns on behalf of the Aboriginal community about the flaws in the legislation and how inadequate they were.
I recognise and agree that this act is decades old and has been recognised for decade as being manifestly woeful and inadequate at protecting Aboriginal heritage. The review of the act that happened in 2019 and 2021 recognised that. Then we had a consultation paper that was released in March 2022 which laid out all the flaws with the legislation and the things that needed to be changed. It is worth going through these and looking at some of those details.
It was noted that Aboriginal cultural heritage in Tasmania has been protected and managed, despite the shortcomings of the act. Minister Jaensch said at the time.
Yes, and Aboriginal heritage has also been damaged and destroyed because of the shortcomings in the act.
There is no doubt about it, the evidence is there.
We were speaking today about Robbins Island. I will speak about Takayna and many other places in Tasmania and the honourable member for Clark, Mr Bayley, is going to mention the situation at Macquarie Point.
The minister said clearly there is a need for reform of the act to be progressed as a matter of urgency. Reform should not wait for a truth-telling and treaty process. He was referring to the fact that regarding the pathway to truth-telling and treaty, the work that was done in that report recommended fixing up this terrible act at that point, but the minister said we should not wait for truth-telling and treaty and that there was merit in proceeding immediately with the measures mentioned and introducing new legislation. The intention of the government then was to develop a draft exposure bill with a view to its introduction in parliament in mid-2023. As other members have mentioned, the Greens have been asking and pressing the government about the progress of this report since the tabling of the March 2022 consultation draft. Ms O’Connor previously, on behalf of the Greens, was taking carriage of this.
I myself remember sitting in Estimates asking the minister for aboriginal affairs questions in 2023, and we were promised that there would be a bill in 2024. In 2024, in the Estimates we were promised there would be a bill tabled by the end of 2024. In the 2024 Estimates we were promised that there would be a bill tabled in March and here we have, with respect, minister, and thank you for your comments about a timeline, we have got another good intention to progress towards tabling a bill in March 2026 for debating at the end of 2026. That’s a four‑year gap, in this government, in any action. The minister promised the Greens under questioning in Estimates in 2023 that the bill was close to completion. In 2024 he said, ‘It will be here by the end of the year.’
I understand now that the minister wants another consultation process, but from the community’s point of view this can only be seen as deliberate stalling. I did hear you minister, when you said that the details are complex and it’s important that they’re achieved with the support and understanding of the Tasmanian community. Well, it won’t always be like that and the point is it can’t be like that because you cannot have both things happening at the same time.
I want to talk about what’s happened in Takayna and the coast of Takayna, that ancient landscape which has been one of the oldest inhabited places of the Palawa/Pakana for tens of thousands of years. It has burial sites, petroglyphs, it has middens which are full of the lives of the people who live there. The stories are there, but what we have at the moment is four-wheel drive access to many of those places still and we have those incredible living stories of people’s lives gouged with huge four-wheel drive tracks and a proposal to open up the west coast Arthur‑Pieman area for four-wheel drive tourism. This is after this Liberal government moved to open the Tarkine coast for four-wheel driving.
The Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre, the EDO, went all the way to the Federal Court to stop that happening. That did stop that temporarily, but then it opened up again. What we’ve got is another attempt by the Liberal government just last year with a four-wheel drive tourism plan. It’s essentially a marketing plan, a $10 million of taxpayer’s money going to drag people from mainland Australia to Tasmania to go four-wheel driving over ancient Aboriginal heritage. This is what the cost is of continuing to delay delivering this legislation.
What it means is there is effectively no way to prevent that sort of outrageous destruction of what is on the planet, the most ancient evidence of people who have lived in a landscape that is cared for today by those people. Cared for by Pakana rangers, cared for by local communities, and yet still, because of the failure of our act, there is no way to properly protect that except for EPBC legislation at the federal level, which the federal Labor Party want to rip up and the federal Liberal opposition is baying them to go in faster and harder and to get rid of all laws that protect nature.
We’ve got a wafer-thin period of time to make sure these ancient landscapes are not destroyed more than they already have been. That’s why it matters so much. We will never get every developer in Tasmania happy about not being able to have their way and having to protect Aboriginal heritage or having to change their development plan and accommodate the fact that they can’t destroy ancient Aboriginal heritage. The relics assessment that is currently in place under the terrible act that we have means that a Tasmanian assessment of Robbins Island and the incredible history and the living landscape of Robbins Island cannot properly protect it because of our laws, and despite the fact the minister said there is a process of that happening, it will not be. I think maybe Ms Dow said that, it will not be comprehensive. It cannot be, and that’s the problem that we need to fix. What we also know from the consultation paper – and I think Ms Dow asked the good question – has any part of the consultation paper changed? Is the direction that the government’s taking on the legislation changing from the sort of issues that they flagged that they would be looking at? Because what was proposed –
Time expired.
