Senator BOURNE (3:56 PM) —The Democrats naturally support this motion. This is something that we have been calling for since 1981. The earliest reference I could find on the parliamentary database was in 1981 when Senator Colin Mason was asking questions of the then Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle. Ever since then we have been calling for it. We have had no luck.

I am sure senators are aware that de jure actually means `by right'. I do not think anybody in this chamber, or probably in Australia, would agree that Indonesia has any right to East Timor. They certainly invaded, took it over and were there for a long time—24 years—but I do not think anybody thinks that they have a right to remain there. Senators will also know, if they have read the 5 May agreement between Portugal, Indonesia and the United Nations, that it says that if the vote is in favour of independence, or not in favour of autonomy as it was put in the agreement—I hope I am getting this right because I do not have it in front of me—the effect is that the Indonesia government would do everything they needed to do in order to allow the people of East Timor their independence. That vote did go in favour of independence and against autonomy. So even the 5 May agreement of this year between Jaime Gama on behalf of Portugal, Ali Alatas on behalf of Indonesia and Kofi Annan on behalf of the United Nations acknowledged that the vote was the final substantive issue in this whole saga and that that vote would determine the actions of the Indonesian parliament.

I am sure they will stand by that; I am sure that that is the case. I am sure that the Indonesian parliament will when it meets, which should be in a couple of weeks, determine that they no longer believe East Timor to be the 27th province of Indonesia. I must say I never believed it to be the 27th province, and it has now become very clear that at least 80 per cent of the East Timorese people never believed it to be the 27th province either. I see no problem at all in anyone voting for this motion. I cannot even see a problem in the government voting for it. I certainly have no problem, and I do not believe the opposition has a problem, with this motion. I think that it is a nice finishing off of Australia's attitude to East Timor. After the last 24 years, this would be a very nice finishing off, that is, removing the fact that the Australian government believes Indonesia ever had or, in particular, has now a right to the territory that is encased in East Timor.