After listening to everyone’s views over the last month, it is clear that it is a debate we need to have. As Australia’s capital city, our history is told in our place names. The facts of Australia’s history never change, but the stories we tell about them do.

We need to do more to bring this country together, and have a more harmonious future. I didn’t run for Parliament because I believe in people being victims; I ran because I want us to work together to make our country and our city better. Whether it be the past covering up of paedophiles, or the stolen generation, the best way for our nation to come together and keep making our country stronger is to tell the truth.

There has been strident, public resistance to the idea of any kind of change from some members of the Place Names committee. That resistance and public criticism has made me more convinced I must keep going. This issue is not personal for me, but it is for some people. Victims have a right to a respectful hearing, and I would not want anybody with a genuine grievance exposed to that kind of reactionary criticism.

In the choice between the hurt that denying our history creates, and the hurt that comes from telling the truth, we should always tell the truth. The Australia we all know and love is a product of all the good things, and all the bad things that happened. That includes the courage, the endurance and the compassion, as well as the corruption, the massacres, and the paedophiles. Denying the bad deeds is the same as denying the good. We are a better country if we are honest about it all, celebrate the good together, and mourn the bad together.

A number of people have argued that we shouldn’t be changing our history. That argument requires a certain kind of doublethink. We cannot change our history: we can only tell the truth, or lie about history. To argue that a lie should be allowed to stand when we know the facts were different is an insult, not just to history, but to the community and the kids we are teaching it to.

One point of view put quite strongly by some is that we should never, ever, change anything. As if admitting we ever made a mistake is the worst thing that could ever happen. Well, I’m big enough to admit I have made mistakes in my life, and there have been plenty of mistakes made in the planning of Canberra. Trying not to repeat the same mistakes is one thing, but real maturity is in admitting, and fixing up the mistakes of the past too. Starting this conversation brings out the best, and the worst in the conversation about the legacy of our nation. To reconcile with our past, we need to be calm, consultative, and inclusive about the way we do it. Making sure everyone gets a fair hearing is the first step. Where there are residents affected, they need to get their say too.

Canberra has renamed places before. Be that the streets of Narrabundah, Blandfordia becoming Forest, NATEX becoming EPIC, or the many past names of the Tuggeranong Hyperdome (now south.point). Across Australia a movement has grown to correct past naming mistakes: Batman, Denison, and McMillan are no longer electorate names, in recognition of their role in Aboriginal massacres.

I was particularly inspired by a number of men who were abused as young boys by then Governor General Sir William Slim. Our society let them down once as boys, and we should not let them down again by ignoring their request that we rename the street named after the paedophile who abused them.

Australian Governments have been issuing a lot of apologies in the last few years, and it is time we made our deeds match our words.