Djab Wurrung Gunnai Gundjitmara woman and independent Senator Lidia Thorpe kicked off her statewide Truth and Justice tour on Wurundjeri Country at Trades Hall on July 23, followed by a First Nations event at Aunty Alma Thorpe’s Gathering Place, Dardi Munwurro on July 24.
The Truth and Justice tour is a statewide community initiative to foster discussions about truth-telling and how to achieve justice for First Nations communities.
Thorpe told the National Indigenous Times that the tour is “about looking at the truth of what we experience in this country as First Peoples and creating space for honest conversations about justice and the future we want to build together”. She said when “people are feeling divided and disconnected from politics, we need more spaces where people can come together as a community and build understanding”.
The Trades Hall night opened with a welcome to country and didgeridoo solo, before MC Marissa Pohlman, the first female First Nations boxer to represent Australia at the Olympics, introduced Lidia.
Thorpe spoke about her work as a senator and the many and varied motions she has initiated and the successes. After that she took questions from the audience and answered them candidly.
She discussed topics including compensation for the Stolen Generations and how the reparation payments were originally means-tested, which reduced the pensions for Elders even after they had fought for them for decades.
Thorpe laughed when speaking about her confrontation with Charles III, the “not-King”, in federal parliament, describing her nervousness beforehand over what to say to him. She said that when the moment arrived the ancestors decided for her. As she was removed by the security guards form parliament, she thought she would end up in the dungeons, but was left in the foyer instead.
Thorpe’s “assault” on Senator Pauline Hanson was raised; Thorpe had ripped up a paper copy of one of Hanson’s motions, which sought to have Senator Fatima Payman’s citizenship investigated, in November 2024, and threw it in her direction. Some pieces of paper appeared to reach Hanson. This led to Thorpe’s week-long suspension from parliament for allegedly making “inappropriate and sometimes abusive comments”.
Thorpe said she advised Prime Minister Anthony Albanese not to hold the Voice referendum, in the absence of a truth-telling commission, because of the pain and suffering it would cause. She was proven right, with the avalanche of racism and bigotry that was unleashed.
Thorpe maintained her “progressive no” position “because First Nations people haven’t ceded sovereignty and don’t obey the constitution, so why would they want to be a group advising a country governed by the constitution”.
In response to a question about founding her own First Nations political party, she pointed to the Indigenous-Aboriginal Party of Australia, and said if she did start a party it would be for everyone.
[Truth and Justice events are being organised across Victoria over 2026 and 2027, including visits to Gippsland, Geelong, Warrnambool, Horsham. You can find more details here.]