‘I will not be silent’: Australia censures senator for King Charles protest
Al Jazeera
Indigenous Senator Lidia Thorpe says she has no regrets as Senate expresses disapproval of protest against the monarch.
Australia’s Senate has voted to censure Indigenous lawmaker Lidia Thorpe after she heckled Britain’s King Charles III during his visit to parliament last month.
The vote, led by Australia’s governing Labor Party, was passed with 46 votes in favour and six against.
Thorpe, a Gunnai, Gunditjmara and Djab-Wurrung woman who represents the state of Victoria, released a statement before the vote, saying she would not be silenced by the measure.
The Senate does not have the power to appoint or remove senators, and censure motions, though politically symbolic, do not carry legal weight.
“I will not be silent. The truth is, this colony is built on stolen land, stolen wealth and stolen lives,” Thorpe said in the statement.
