This information relates to the 2022 Federal Election and may no longer be current. 

Greens Policy Platform – latest announcements​

Treaty And First Nations Justice

The Greens plan to develop a Treaty and begin the process of truth-telling and healing.

This country was invaded. Sovereignty from First Nations people was never ceded. First Nations people were violently dispossessed, had their children stolen, their families separated and their lands, waters and skies stolen and destroyed.

Successive governments have perpetrated grave injustices, dispossession and imprisonment since colonisation, which continues to this day.  This systemic racism, that is racism that is embedded into the fabric of our laws and social policies in this country, impacts every aspect of First Nations people’s lives. 

Hundreds of First Nations Aboriginal people have died in police custody and no one has been held to account. Racist policies continue to result in health inequities and educational inequality. Aggressive policing of First Nations children, adults and Elders results in child removal, disproportionate incarceration and ultimately deaths in custody. 

We will push the Labor Government to go further and faster to a national process of truth telling and healing which is how we begin our journey towards a Treaty or Treaties with First Nations people.

A Treaty will create a unified national identity that celebrates what unites us, protects the rights of First Nations people and their cultures while also acknowledging the ongoing and historical injustices of colonisation.

Photo of a smiling person. Text reads, We can’t move forward, until we reckon with the truth about our history

Truth and Justice Commission

Our journey to Treaty involves truth-telling and healing first. This means exploring, understanding, and reckoning with our painful past and the impact it continues to have on First Nations people and their cultures.

A Treaty, or Treaties, is an opportunity for us to tell the story of who we want to be as a country. 

The Greens plan includes:

  • $250m for a national Truth and Justice Commission, an independent body with the powers of a Royal Commission. The Commission would investigate and reveal historic and ongoing human rights abuses, wrongdoing, and provide recommendations on how to heal from them. 
  • The Truth and Justice Commission will lay the foundations to engage and involve the community in discussing, raising awareness and developing the Treaty or Treaties. 
Photo of a smiling person. Text reads, Everyone should enjoy the same access to healthcare

First Nations Health

Many First Nations communities need better access to health services, and the health centres they rely on need more resources to empower First Nations people to get what they need to be and stay well. 

Decisions made by successive governments have resulted in health inequality. 

The Greens plan includes:

  • $371m to self-determined, community-led First Nations health services to increase their capacity to care for their own communities
  • Ensure people have early access to preventative programs and provide funding of $1.07b to build First Nations owned healing places
  • Expand Gold Card access to First Nations Elders aged 60 and above so they can access the healthcare, treatment and services they deserve
  • Grow the First Nations health and wellbeing workforce to provide culturally appropriate care to their communities 
Photo of a smiling person. Text reads, We need to break the cycle and stop the trauma

Compensation for Stolen Generations survivors

As a result of racist government policy, children from the Stolen Generation were enslaved, trained as servants, abused, assaulted, or fostered into other families, resulting in incredible trauma. 
 
Members of the Stolen Generations are more likely to experience a range of adverse outcomes, including poor health, especially mental health, including high incidences of anxiety, depression, PTSD and suicide, along with alcohol abuse.

This deep trauma also impacted the families and communities of members of the Stolen Generations. Many survivors of the Stolen Generations are still not sure where they come from or who their families are, they deserve to know who they are.

Descendants of the Stolen Generations are 1.5 times as likely to be in poorer health compared to other First Nations people

The Greens plan includes:

  • Establish compensation scheme, providing  each survivor with a $200,000 payment to support them and their families as they age and continue to heal 
  • $7,000 payment for funeral expenses
  • Provide a range of services to support the emotional and mental health needs of survivors and their families
Photo of a smiling person. Text reads, Rangers can harness thousands of years of knowledge

Care for Country

First Nations people have cared for lands and waters for tens of thousands of years. But successive governments have disregarded First Nations science and land management, and undermined Aboriginal land rights and heritage protections resulting in the kind of destruction we saw at Juukan Gorge.  

Billionaires, big polluters and big corporations profiteer continue to off stolen land.

The Greens plan includes:

  • Strong laws to protect First Nations cultural heritage, knowledge and intellectual property
  • $767m over the forward estimates to expand the First Nations ranger programs and Indigenous Protected Areas to heal Country by returning land to First Nations management and providing long-term sustainable jobs
Photo of a smiling person. Text reads, Kids should be at school, not in jail

Fix our Justice System

No matter who we are, the legal system needs to protect all of us equally. Our legal system fails First Nations people regularly, and the consequences can be a matter of life or death. The system is too expensive, too hard to access and often, it’s simply racist.

First Nations children as young as ten are regularly being imprisoned

The Greens plan includes:

  • Raise the age of legal responsibility to at least 14 years and support children through culturally safe and supportive programs to ensure kids get back on track 
  • Double the funding for legal assistance services and provide an extra $310 million per year so all people have access to legal help when they need it 
  • Establish a First Nations legal defence fund so communities can access independent legal advice to protect their heritage, including sites of significance from inappropriate development or destruction
  • $382m, with equal contribution from the states and territories, to set up independent police and prison oversight mechanisms and establish a national police ombudsman system to investigate all police complaints
  • from the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, implement the recommendations from the Australian Law Reform Commissions’ Pathway to Justice report, and implement the recommendations from the Royal Commission into the Detention and Protection of Children in the Northern Territory, so we can build communities not prisons. 

Together, we’re powerful.

We have a plan to reduce the cost of living, make housing more affordable, tackle the climate crisis, and make sure everyone is looked after.

We'll take on the big corporations, stop them ripping you off, and and tax them to fund the things that everyone needs. The Greens are fighting for you.