Lidia Thorpe

Lidia Thorpe

Lidia Thorpe was the Australian Greens senator for Victoria, Australia from 2020 - 2023. She is the "first Aboriginal woman elected to Victorian parliament". Her sister is Meriki Onus.

Background

Excerpt from The Guardian:

Thorpe was one of seven delegates who walked out of the Uluru convention in 2017, the forum that resulted in the drafting of the Uluru statement from the heart, over the issue of sovereignty. They held that forming a voice to parliament under the Australian constitution would be seen as ceding sovereignty – a thing that, all 250 delegates agreed, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples had never done.

At the time, Thorpe was the cochair of the Victorian NAIDOC Committee. She has been involved in Aboriginal politics since birth: her grandmother, Alma Thorpe, helped found the Victorian Aboriginal Health Service in Fitzroy in 1973. Her mother, Marjorie Thorpe, was a commissioner of the stolen generations inquiry that produced the Bringing Them Home report. Her first job was working for her uncle Robbie Thorpe, who ran the Koori Information Centre in Fitzroy.

Verbatim from Lidia Thorpe's profile at the Greens website:

"Lidia Thorpe is a proud DjabWurrung Gunnai Gunditjmara woman, the former member for Northcote in the Victorian Legislative Assembly and formerly an Australian Senator for the Greens.

Lidia raised three children as a single mum and went on to university to study policy. Prior to entering politics she was the managing director of Clan Corporation, a sustainable housing and renewable energy business catering to remote Aboriginal communities, as well as the chair of the Victorian NAIDOC Committee. She has also been an adviser to Our Watch, Environment Victoria, the Australian Conservation Foundation and more.

In 2017, Lidia was the first Aboriginal woman elected to Victorian parliament. Her portfolios included Aboriginal affairs, mental health, consumer affairs and sport.

In 2020, Lidia was preselected to fill the Senate vacancy created by the resignation of Richard Di Natale. Her portfolios included First Nations, the Republic and sport.

Senator Thorpe has drawn attention to human rights abuses at Don Dale, fought the deportation of First Nations people, fearlessly challenged the colonial relics of parliamentary process and fiercely pursued Treaty.

In 2023 after a phenomenal contribution to the Greens, Lidia left the party to advance the Blak Sovereignty movement.

Rogatyuk connection

Denis Rogatyuk with Lidia Thorpe.

Hannah Middleton connection

Hannah Middleton, a leading Communist Party of Australia activist with Greens Lidia Thorpe and Jenny Munro.