Ms BURNEY (Barton—Minister for Indigenous Australians) (16:30): On indulgence—I rise to join with the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, who earlier today spoke in the condolence motion for Archie Roach, who passed away on Saturday. I rise to pay tribute to the memory and the life of Uncle Archie Roach, and the family, as we know, has given permission for us to use his name and his image to preserve and continue his legacy. On Saturday night, there was a ripple around the Garma festival as the news spread about the passing of Archie Roach. Everywhere you were, there were sounds of wailing, crying, with people clinging to each other in grief. Archie Roach was born in 1956. He was my contemporary. A member of the stolen generation, Uncle Archie was just three years old when he was taken from his parents and that was in 1960. Archie's memory from that day was his father screaming, restrained by the police, while all but one child were loaded into a big black car. Archie Roach never saw his parents again. Later in life he wrote the wrote the song that we all know so well, 'Took The Children Away'. In that he wrote: Snatched from their mother's breast Said this is for the best He was placed in a children's home and a series of foster homes until he finally found a family he could call home. He was seven years old. Uncle Archie was 14 years when he received a letter about the death of his mother. Until that day, he didn't know he had a family. Shocked and angry, he ran away from home at 15, first to Sydney then to the streets of Adelaide and Melbourne, always searching for his family and his identity. But it was while he was in Adelaide that he met his soulmate, the remarkable Ruby Hunter. Both homeless at the time, they met at a Salvation Army drop-in centre called, of all things, The Peoples Palace. Uncle Archie said he always remembered the day he met Ruby. She was wearing a blue dress and he always remembered that. Uncle Archie Roach was a pioneer of First Nations music, the voice of a generation. He was a singer, a poet and truth teller. For many Australians his song, 'Took the Children Away', which he wrote in 1990, was their first exposure to the horrors of the stolen generations. His music shone a light on the truth of that policy. He always said his music was born of pain and trauma but driven by hope and healing. Paul Kelly said of Archie, 'big tree down, weeping in the forest.' Paul Kelly of course collaborated with Archie Roach in his first album, Charcoal Lane. His early passing at 66 underscores the life expectancy gap for First Nations people. I finish up with the last words of 'Took The Children Away'. It finishes like this: Back to their mother Back to their father Back to their sister Back to their brother Back to their people Back to their land All the children come back The children come back The children come back And then he writes: Yes I came back.