Greens senator to attend anti-monarchy protest instead of Queen’s memorial
Lidia Thorpe will snub the Queen’s memorial in Canberra for an Indigenous ceremony, followed by an anti-monarchy protest.
Greens senator Lidia Thorpe will snub the Queen’s memorial in Canberra on Thursday, breaking ranks with party leader Adam Bandt, who is attending the event.
With all federal MPs and senators invited to Parliament House, Senator Thorpe will instead be in Melbourne attending an Indigenous healing ceremony followed by an “abolish the monarchy” protest march.
The anti-monarchy protest march, organised by Warriors of the Aboriginal Resistance, is also aimed at raising awareness for Indigenous deaths in custody.
“On September 22, I’ll be mourning our ancestors and our old people who fought in the Frontier Wars and who died fighting for this country,” Senator Thorpe told The Australian.
“After a healing ceremony, I’ll be marching to protest over 500 deaths in custody since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. Treaty is the solution to the injustices we face, by bringing people together to end the war that started in 1788.”
A spokesman for Mr Bandt confirmed the Greens leader would attend the memorial to honour the life of the late Queen.
On Sunday, Anthony Albanese said every federal politician had been invited to the event at parliament's Great Hall.
The Prime Minister said all the state premiers and territory chief ministers had confirmed their intention to attend the memorial, along with state governors.
All justices of the High Court of Australia will also be there.
Former Sunrise host Melissa Doyle will be the MC for the service, with singer Anthony Callea to perform.
Mr Albanese and Peter Dutton will provide “short tributes” to the Queen. “It will be an opportunity to mourn as a nation as well,” Mr Albanese told Sky News. “There will be events taking place in states and territories hosted by local government, hosted by local communities around the nation. So it will be an important day to pay tribute to the life and service of the Queen.”
The group organising the healing ceremony, Djirri Djirri, wrote on social media it chose to hold the event on the “day set aside by the government to ‘pay respects’ to a person living on the other side of the world”.
“We want to reclaim this space for our Sorry Business, as a time to mourn and commemorate our true kings and queens (repurposing those terms as well) and remember them, honour them, commemorate them,” the group said on Facebook.
A survey by Compass Polling commissioned by the Menzies Research Centre showed support for the monarchy had grown since the death of the Queen. The survey, conducted last week, showed 57 per cent of people supported retaining the British monarch as Australia’s head of state, up from 43 per cent in January.
Seventy-five per cent of respondents believed Charles would make a good King, with half of Labor voters now opposing a republic.
Acting Prime Minister Richard Marles said his support for a republic “has not changed” and there would be “plenty of time to talk about all of that” in the future.
“Right now, I think it is fair we acknowledge the life of a genuinely remarkable human being and a person who has given an enormous amount of service to our nation,” he told the ABC.
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