The Northern Territory’s other senator, Indigenous Affairs Minister Nigel Scullion, told the ABC that Labor should avoid “another captain’s pick” and Senator Peris “needs to clarify when she knew that she was abandoning her constituents”.
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“I want to make this clear”.
Opposition Leader Bill Shorten would not rule out her potential exit and on Tuesday afternoon, her decision not to stand at the July 2 election was made formal. “It’s not easy to wake up every morning and bounce out of bed and pretend that life’s fantastic, because it isn’t”, Peris said.
When asked whether Territorians deserved a better explanation for her departure, she said: “I’m sure you don’t go around every day justifying the things that you do…”
“Aboriginal people have no inherited wealth, they have inherited pain”.
Former NT Labor government minister Malarndirri McCarthy has thrown her hat in the ring, with Senator Peris’s chief-of-staff Ursula Raymond and former NT minister Kon Vatskalis also interested.
Peris reportedly has had offers from the Australian Football League to take a top Indigenous development role with the code, but she did not detail her exact reasons for leaving the Senate or exactly what her next role would be.
Mr Shorten also welcomed her decision to support her family.
As the first Aboriginal female in Federal politics as well as the Labor Party’s first Aboriginal member in Federal Parliament I certainly had challenges, but none that I couldn’t handle or was not prepared for, having already lived a very public and documented life.
The Labor campaign was blindsided on Monday by Fairfax Media’s revelations that Senator Peris was in talks with the AFL about a job opportunity three years after being handpicked by Julia Gillard, at the expense of Labor senator Trish Crossin.
In what is shaping as a hotly contested new position, another strongly favoured contender is Justin Mohamed, the chief executive of Reconciliation Australia. As she failed to make an impact in the senate, she was “frozen out” of the information stream within her party, the article noted.
“Nova Peris is a very strong representative for the Territory and indeed all Indigenous Australians”, he said. She’s been a champion on the track, she she’s been a champion in the parliament.
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She was backed up by Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, who said the senator’s “choosing the terms on which she leaves” shows her dignity and does not diminish her accomplishments in the Parliament. “Nova Peris’ accomplishments are not in any fashion diminished in my opinion”. “No one should judge me”.
