Senator Lidia Thorpe rejects calls for her resignation: ‘No one can kick me out’

Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe has rejected calls for her to resign after her protest during the King’s parliamentary welcome ceremony, saying “no one can kick me out”.

Senator Thorpe has denied she broke her sworn affirmation to the monarch when she marched toward King Charles and Queen Camilla during a reception at Parliament on Monday yelling “you are not our king” and accusing the royals of “genocide”.

Since the incident, which made international headlines, Ms Thorpe has faced staunch criticism from across the political fold and community — including respected Indigenous leaders — and calls for her resignation.

But the Gunnai, Gunditjmara and Djab Wurrung woman insists she can’t be kicked out of parliament for breaching the parliamentary oath because she technically didn’t swear allegiance to the crown — instead, she says she swore allegiance to the Queen’s “hairs”.

“I’m an independent. No one can kick me out of there. I’m there to fulfil my job,” Ms Thorpe told the Today Show on Thursday morning.

“I represent the Blak Sovereign Movement, which is about questioning the sovereignty of the Crown, and I’m calling for a treaty.

“This Government has walked back a treaty. I know the Opposition is not interested in a treaty.”

She said there was nowhere else to go to get her message across but straight to “the King of England”.

“I have a Senate seat for the next three and a half years, and I’ll be using that to get justice for my people,” she added, calling her work “unfinished business”.

She also described having to take the parliamentary oath as “completely inappropriate and self-destroying”.

Today Show host Karl Stefanovic said Ms Thorpe may be the “most loathed woman in Parliament in Canberra” after her stunt, but the Senator said she was “used to that treatment”.

“I am the black sheep of the family, if you like. But I wanted to send a message to the King. I got that message across, the world is talking about it.”

She declared her protest a success because of the global attention it gained.

“I need to bring attention to the world because the Parliament don’t listen, the politicians don’t listen. So I need to message the world to say, hey, this is what’s going on here,” Ms Thorpe said.

She continued: “We need to get rid of the crown who dictates to us what we do in our country.

“We can make the decisions for ourselves, and I think we need to grow up as a nation and get rid of him (King Charles) and have our own head of state.”