‘Truth hurts’: Lidia Thorpe doubles down on decision to call Queen a ‘coloniser’

A Victorian senator has doubled down on a controversial action in which she referred to the Queen as a “coloniser”.

Greens senator Lidia Thorpe is refusing to back down from branding the Queen a “coloniser”, questioning why the English royal “deserves respect” in the first place.

The Victorian Djab Wurrung, Gunnai and Gunditjmara senator put her fist in the air as she declined to recite the oath of allegiance in the chamber on Monday.

She stated: “I sovereign, Lidia Thorpe, do solemnly and sincerely swear that I will be faithful and I bear allegiance to the colonising Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II”.

Victorian senator Lidia Thorpe called the Queen a ‘coloniser’ during her oath on Monday morning. Picture: AAP / Lukas Coch

She was quickly met with interjections from Senate colleagues, who told her she was “not a senator” if she did not correctly recite the oath.

Senate President Sue Lines told Senator Thorpe she would need to recite the oath “as printed on the card”.

She went on to take the oath again, but later took to Twitter to share a photo of her punching the air, writing: “Sovereignty never ceded”.

Speaking with 3AW on Tuesday, the senator said her second oath was “false” in an illegitimate parliament without a treaty with Australia’s First People.

“To be told that I have to swear allegiance to a Queen from another country, I feel really uncomfortable about that, given I am a First Nations woman,” Senator Thorpe said.

“My allegiance is to this country and the people of this country, not to a queen who lives in England and who has not been elected.”

Greens leader Adam Bandt illustrated his support for Senator Thorpe on Twitter, sharing the image and writing: “Always was, always will be”.

Sovereignty never ceded. https://t.co/OowLrlUApy

— Senator Lidia Thorpe (@SenatorThorpe) August 1, 2022

It’s not the first time Senator Thorpe has caused controversy in the Senate.

On Tuesday, she reiterated her role as an Indigenous woman was to “infiltrate” the Senate.

“I just think that we need to put a mirror up to ourselves as a nation, and look at who we are swearing our allegiance to, and what that actually means for us, as everyday people, in this country,” Senator Thorpe said.

Last month, she told ABC radio the Australian flag represented “dispossession, massacre and genocide”.