‘Embarrassing and disrespectful’: Lidia Thorpe faces backlash over King Charles protest
Senator Lidia Thorpe has been criticised by politicians and Indigenous leaders after she confronted King Charles III during his visit to Canberra,
Waiting until speeches in the Great Hall of Parliament House finished on Monday, Thorpe addressed the King, yelling that she did not accept his sovereignty.
“You committed genocide against our people; give us our land back; give us back what you stole from us … we want a treaty in this country,” she shouted, before being escorted out.
Thorpe, a Gunnai, Gunditjmara and Djab Wurrung Indigenous woman, has since said she was forced to heckle the King after her several letters and requests for a meeting were “ignored”.
However, the backlash to the defiant display has been swift, with both sides of parliament saying Thorpe’s protest was “disrespectful”.
Former senator Nova Peris, who was the first Aboriginal woman elected to federal parliament, said she was “deeply disappointed” by the way Thorpe chose to engage with the King.
“Her outburst, which disrupted what should have been a respectful event, was both embarrassing and disrespectful to our nation and the Royal Family,” she wrote on X overnight.
Peris said a journey to reconciliation “requires respectful dialogue, mutual understanding” instead of “divisive actions that draw attention away from the progress we are making as a country”.
Opposition leader Peter Dutton told ABC’s RN Breakfast that Thorpe “didn’t advance anyone’s cause”, saying: “sometimes people make it all about themselves, and I think that’s what yesterday was”.
Labor senator Murray Watt also questioned the effectiveness of Thorpe’s display after he failed to hear her message from within the room.
“I don’t think it worked. I don’t think it got the message through to anyone in the room,” he said on ABC’s Q+A on Monday night.
“If the idea was to raise the issue with the people who were in the room, I think it failed miserably.”
Housing minister Clare O’Neil said as a senator, Thorpe had other mechanisms with which to raise her issues.
“As senators and members of parliament, we’ve got lots of ways that we can express and advocate our views and I don’t think what happened yesterday was appropriate,” O’Neil said.
She said the display took away from a beautiful welcome to Country by Indigenous leader Aunty Violet Sheridan who had warmly welcomed Charles and his wife, Queen Camilla.
Thorpe’s protest follows several demonstrations, including large crowds gathering behind a large “decolonise” banner in Sydney as the
Thorpe doubles down on genocide calls
Speaking on Tuesday, Thorpe said her repeated written requests for a meeting and a “respectful conversation” with the monarch had been ignored every time.
“That wasn’t afforded to me, so I did that for my people. I did that for my grandmother, and I wanted the world to know that we need a treaty here and we want an end to this ongoing war against first peoples in this country,” she told ABC radio.
“I don’t subscribe to assimilating myself into the colonial structure.”
Thorpe doubled down on her accusation the King was complicit in the genocide of Indigenous people by remaining silent.
“Why doesn’t he say, ‘I am sorry for the many, many thousands of massacres that happened in this country and that my ancestors and my kingdom are responsible for that’,” she said.
Asked about her affirmation of allegiance to the crown when she was sworn in as a parliamentarian, Thorpe said she did that under duress and to fulfil her duties.
Thorpe demanded the UK hand back Indigenous artefacts and remains that had been taken.
With additional reporting from AAP
