Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has been on the receiving end of threats because of her views on Aboriginal affairs, but she says that won't stop her continuing to speak out.
The Northern Territory Country Liberal Party (CLP) senator says she's gone against the grain in speaking out about violence, sexual abuse and, more recently, the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum, and says using her voice hasn't been clear-cut.
Senator Nampijinpa Price, who served her hometown of Alice Springs as a councillor and then its deputy mayor, was elected to represent the Northern Territory as senator in 2022.
"As Aboriginal women, there's always the threat of violence … we're expected to toe the line," the senator said.
"In traditional terms we're supposed to know our place and not speak out of turn on issues that might be uncomfortable for others."
Speaking to Stateline NT, the senator credits her Warlpiri and Celtic heritage for giving her the grit to be on the federal political stage, but she says her views have come at a cost.
"It is not just [my] stance on the Voice, it's also the stance [that] it's not somehow acceptable to be a conservative Aboriginal woman," she said.
"There are people that I've grown up with in my hometown [who] believe that, adults who I would regard as family, they've known me since I was a baby, that won't even acknowledge me now."
"I have some female relatives who will support me and aren't afraid to stand up and speak, but there will be family members who will keep their distance for their own fear of if they appear to be supportive of me, then they could be targeted."
'No regrets' on Voice No campaign
Last year, the first-time senator essentially became the face of the No campaign on the referendum to enshrine an Indigenous Voice to Parliament in the constitution.
She also quickly climbed the ranks of the federal Coalition to become the shadow minister for Indigenous Australians.
Reflecting on the six months since Australians voted against the Voice, the senator said she didn't "have a single regret".
Loading..."I think now we have fertile ground to move forward, to continue to call for common-sense approaches," she said.
Senator Nampijinpa Price said the referendum created "more division" that Australia "didn't need" and disputed claims that disinformation from the No side swayed votes.
"If a suggestion is being put to you, a grand idea, if you don't have the detail of that grand idea, if you don't know what the detail is, why would you support it?," she said.
"That was the basic truth of the situation – there was no detail, and if you don't know what the detail is, well, you're not going to support it."
She also said the millions of dollars spent on the referendum could have been better spent on improving outcomes for Indigenous people facing entrenched disadvantage, citing an investment in boarding facilities for children at a local school in Alice Springs as one example.
How Indigenous funding was being allocated and spent in Australia was a key theme for No campaigners in the lead-up to the referendum, with the federal Coalition using the final weeks of the referendum campaign to call for an audit into Indigenous expenditure.
Alice Springs unrest 'destructive'
Before entering federal politics, Senator Nampijinpa Price served on the Alice Springs Town Council, where for years she saw her hometown garner national headlines over its crime rates.
So when vision surfaced of rioting outside a local pub in Alice Springs in March, the shock hit home.
Loading...Earlier that month, 18-year-old Kumanjayi Petrick died after a car crash in Alice Springs. The eight other passengers fled the scene.
A cultural ceremony held for the teenager on March 26 turned violent, and grief and anger between the families saw riots erupt at a town camp and at the tavern.
Relatives say those who attacked the tavern were searching for someone drinking inside.
"Knowing that elements of that was attached to traditional cultural payback … it's time we stop doing things this way because it is destructive," Senator Nampijinpa Price said.
Loading...The rioting prompted the NT government to enforce a youth curfew in Alice Springs, and extra police resources from South Australia and around the territory were flown in to help.
"We need to attract more police, we need to invest in our police and we need to do better to repair the relationships with our community members and police," she said.
"Lifting standards, stepping away from separatism, improving the education system and protecting our children and our most vulnerable is what we need to do."
Desensitisation fears as NT election looms
As the NT edges closer to a general election in August, Senator Nampijinpa Price fears Territorians are becoming desensitised to the social issues playing out on the ground.
"When school children are getting picked up from school, the conversation between them is 'oh my dad has a baseball bat under the bed' or 'we've just installed cameras at our place just in case somebody breaks in'," she said.
"How did we get to a point where we are normalising this kind of behaviour in our communities and accepting that?"
She conceded it would take time and the right investment to see a turnaround in the territory irrespective of which party won office, and said the urgency was real.