Queensland’s Indigenous truth-telling inquiry will have the power to force the state’s police commissioner to give evidence under legislative changes passed in parliament.
In March, the Queensland Human Rights Commission raised concerns that the police force had not been included in the government’s list of those who could be invited or compelled to attend the inquiry, despite the institution’s dark colonial history.
On Wednesday, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander partnerships minister, Craig Crawford, confirmed the government would ensure the Queensland police commissioner, Katarina Carroll, could appear at the hearings.
“[The government is] putting through an amendment in the bill this afternoon, that includes the police commissioner in that list … to make it absolutely crystal clear,” Crawford told Guardian Australia.
The bill was passed through parliament on Wednesday afternoon.
A Queensland police service spokesperson said the force “is committed to reconciliation and is actively involved in [the] path to treaty, and will take part in the truth-telling inquiry if invited”.
Crawford said the “landmark” legislation to establish the inquiry will set the foundations for treaty negotiations between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and the government.
“We know that governments come and go, and the last thing that First Nations leaders wanted was for a government in the future to tear it up, water it down, defund it,” Crawford said.
“Treaty has been something that has been called for across this country for so many decades.
“To think that today we’ll officially pass a bill that goes towards delivering exactly that – that’s a pretty big moment, and a pretty emotional moment for a lot of us.”
Leeanne Enoch, the first Aboriginal woman elected to the Queensland parliament, said the bill was a “history-making moment”.
“Colonisation and its multiple policy settings underpinned by an absence of treaty has left its mark on our state and on our identity,” she said.
“Today we set a legislative course to look deeply and honestly into the path that was laid out when terra nullius, this country’s first lie, provided the foundation for the discarding of First Nations peoples who have lived in and cared for this place for thousands of generations.”
The state’s opposition leader, David Crisafulli, said he hoped the billcould be “the catalyst for true accountability of government” and improve the lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in this state.
The Greens MP for South Brisbane, Amy MacMahon, also expressed her support for the bill in parliament on Tuesday.
“Treaty must be built on truth, and it must be a truth that is publicly acknowledged,” she said.
“The truth-telling process will be cathartic, if not a painful chapter in this journey we are all on.”
Crawford said the next steps would be important and there was a lot of work to do over the next six months.
This includes hiring five people to run the truth-telling inquiry, with at least three of those being of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent, and recruiting the Treaty Institute council, he said.
“We’ll have a celebration for a day or two, and then we’ll be like, get back to work, right? We feel that burden, but we aim to deliver.”
