What did the NO vote actually achieve?
Today, we know the result of this referendum that has hung over us for what seems an eternity.
According to the polls and the media (notably News Corp), the “NO” campaign has won. Both sides exhausted their arguments with words that either spoke the truth, half-truths, or full-on lies – or repeated the exact same words for months.
It was a simple referendum that, if won, would have seen First Nations people take their rightful place in our society, recorded in our constitution. A proposition not at all unreasonable.
Secondly was a proposal to give a voice to these people who once needed no such thing. A voice recommending things to the Australian Parliament that might improve their lives, their health, their education and their longevity. Doing whatever they requested their way instead of the white man’s. However, the Parliament, if desired, could refuse any such request.
It was to be a voice that might make them as equal to us than they are now. But asking for that from conservatives with a superiority complex and a “born-to-rule” attitude was a bridge too far.
The proposal’s details were relatively simple and easy to understand until the warriors of relentless negativity with no motive other than to destroy an idea entered the fray.
Understanding why the conservative parties would want to waste this opportunity for the Indigenous people of this nation to advance themselves takes a bit of insight. First, one must look at the character of those who championed a conservative ‘No’ vote. From John Howard Tony Abbott to Peter Dutton, the forces of conservatism grew to oppose this referendum in the knowledge that their opposition would destroy it. Only parties without conscience, empathy and empty hearts would do such a thing.
The National Party, led by David Littleproud without much introspection or conscience, showed their true colours by opposing it before the questions were even known. He looked cowardly in the face of such uninformed thinking.
Peter Dutton, the negatively inclined Leader of the Opposition, opposed the referendum because it is what conservatives do. Afraid of change unless it profits. Is he a racist? I don’t know, but a glance at his history might illuminate.
There was never anything in it politically for him. It has yet to show him as an informed leader with a touch of sageness. On the contrary, this hostile victory has portrayed him as just one of those awful right-wing leaders from the darkened world of Trump.
His decision to oppose won’t win the teal seats back from the independent members of Parliament, far from it. He will only enhance his reputation as another in the Abbott mould – another spoiler. Being constantly pessimistic in a changing world will not convince the undecided, young, or disengaged voters who want change. It is not a strategy for winning the next election.
Joining the YES campaign could have changed his public image, had he taken a bi-partisan approach.
Aboriginal leaders Warren Mundine and Jacinta Yangapi Nampijinpa Price supported a NO vote because they wanted more than a voice. However, Mundine was so difficult to understand at times that I needed help comprehending his confusion. They wanted political power to go with a treaty designed by them.
They have both experienced success in life and may not want others to have the privileges that go with it.
Contradicting that, however, is that the LNP want Indigenous people to know their place in society. Equality is a word they would dare not use.
Two weeks ago, it became apparent that Dutton and Albanese were beginning to position themselves for a post-referendum period when both parties would require different words to explain a NO victory.
Why did the YES vote lose so miserably after 15 years of negotiation, endless meetings, goodwill, and good ideas? Let’s start with a known fact: Referendums have always been historically difficult to win, especially without consensus.
The Voice could have succeeded with Peter Dutton’s and his party’s support, but if politics is about ideas, he is totally against them. Like myself, those on the YES side will see it as an opportunity missed.
We will feel cheated that the voices of Dutton, Price and Mundine convinced most of the population that 1.4% of our people should be subjected to no improvement in their living standards while we want more. I feel ashamed that we cannot admit to the Aboriginal’s unique standing among us.
Of course, with truthfulness, we will feel aggrieved and, in part, blame the News Corp’s “no news” saturation and their dedication to conservative values. Some of us will feel guilty for not doing more. Others will wonder about the tools of propaganda and its success at conning the people. Scare campaigns still work as efficiently as not saying how you would approach the problem.
Those on the right will display their self-righteousness, telling the Prime Minister and our First Nations people it was the NO who were right all along and that the Prime Minister should get another job because he lacks judgment.
Now, having recorded a telling victory, Price will, in her high-handed way, demand that negotiations begin immediately for a treaty. She is probably not interested in any truth-telling. They will tell Albanese and his Government that the money would have been better spent on matches rather than wasting it on a proposal without any information about how it would work.
The Government will be less inclined to talk about a Treaty now than if the YES vote had won. That’s human nature. This means that we can forget the past few months’ events and the goodwill of our Aboriginal peoples. The status quo will remain in place for some time now, and Dutton, Mundine and Price should take the blame. Our First Nations peoples will justifiably feel angry and vent their spleen. Albanese may talk about alternatives, but there are none on the table.
However, history shows no Government has ever lost an election after losing a referendum. (“If you don’t know, vote no”) was a message calculated to turn off lazy minds who might be bothered to find out, and, in the course of it being too hard, that’s what they did?
For his part, Peter Dutton is still acting as a leader left over from ten years of less-than-mediocre governance. A group of right-wing wankers that showed a liking for corruption and wrongdoing. Opposition, for opposition’s sake, is a useless compass when seeking the highest office.
He is fast becoming Australia’s Donald Trump. Full of the same kind of bullshit. His exaggerated style speaks from the lowest podium about things of monumental importance. He offers nothing other than his self-importance, which may be necessary to him, but in terms of the nation, it is nothing more than weaponised mendacity.
The failure of the YES VOTE will flatten the many fine people, not just First Nations people, who thought they might add a bit of history to the already 65,000 years of existence. They have taught us a patience that ever lingers, talking to the light of day and the spirits of the blackest nights.
Last but not least, l believe Peter Dutton has circumvented any chance of us becoming a republic soon.
My thought for the day
A leader with any character would slap down members of his shadow cabinet who roam the road of racism with all the force of a heavy roller. Dutton, however, is joined at the hip.
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Return to home pageAnother wasted opportunity to promote Australia into a forward thinking nation ready to stand alone without any apron strings to Europe’s most dysfunctional family. Certainly the sacked LIARBRAL$ Prim Monsters from 2007 to 2023 will be licking their lips in anticipation of foreign awards for services to foreign owned multinational corporations covetously eyeing the profits from Australian natural mineral wealth.
Poor fellow my country what have we become ,We are becoming more like America every day where lies hate and fear are winning ,is this going to be the norm,
Many said the voice would devide us going on this referendum we are miles apart now,
Quite a bit of sour grapes here,unfortunately we have learned early what a liar Albasleezy and his government are,we have been let down on many promises he made before he became Prime Minster,so how would anyone trust this guy again,so why should we trust him now,i think your find that’s why most people voted NO,not any of the bull you have come out with
Thank you for such an insightful article John.
My heart weeps for the lost chance that this nation had to walk hand in hand with the people whose lives do matter.
Well said John Lord !
Yet again the majority of Australian’s failed the intelligence test.
The whole No side was LIES,and FEAR. Eg: Divisive – Is NOT an argument but an empty slogan. By their (lack of) logic, elections are divisive so they shouldn’t happen. Plus, having different views, is NOT divisive.
While the YES side was factual. Eg: That it was an Advisory Group only to Parliament Enshrined in the Constitution.Along with First Nations People finally being recognised in the Constitution.
As usual the ignorant are might, but not right.
We have been told by Treaty advocates that there must be treaties with many clan groups throughout the nation : one ‘blakfella cannot speak for another blakfella’.
Some see Treaty as a Bill of Rights, others as a cargo-cult for returning land and sovereignty to traditional owners with punitive reparations on settlers.
We know that the LNP will oppose !
I’m not sure that I have the energy or the will to go through this again.
Lest we forget that at heart we are all Australians.
One wonders if’n the people’s of the Pacific will start wanting to learn Putonghua now that Australia has voted No.
Will they think or say, “Australians can’t look after or respect their own black fella’s, what hope have we got”
Dutton was wrong. The referendum didn’t divide us.
The result did.
I think it’s time we looked at bringing back something like ATSIC.
I do not want for some time, to hear anything about mateship, or the generosity of Australians.
First Nations People must be feeling like outcasts in their own country today.So very sad.
Aus just dodged a Machiavellian attempt by the United Nations (via UNDRIP backing of the YES camp), to try to split Aus along a fracture line of race. The result is a minor setback for the UN, they won’t give up, they want it all.
UNDRIP is not misinformation, UNDRIP is not disinformation. The UN has stated its position and only a fool would dismiss their plans. The UN, as one of the poster childs of post-Communist ideology, has quietly been manifesting its agenda behind the public’s back. The EU ‘vulture culture’ – the UN, WEF & WHO, they all need to be rejected.
Let them offer advice, but Aus should withdraw support.
In fact, here’s a question for the next referendum – ‘Do you support the Aus Govt signing onto WHO International Health Regulation amendments which will see Aust surrender its ability to make its own health-related decisions?’ YES or NO. Now Albanese can stop pretending that govts were listening to FN people. We never needed a referendum for politicians to start listening. Here is Labor’s chance to remedy disadvantage, eg, investigate why Land Councils have achieved a backwardation of living conditions for FN people.
Re the thought bubble that Jacinta Price will ‘demand that negotiations begin immediately for a treaty” – she should do it. But the process will need to be initiated so that the UN has no opportunity to run interference.
As for the MSM reaction to this referendum, they tried so hard the poor darlings, pushing a narrative that suited THEIR agenda. The unsurprising thing is they are still pointing the bone at everyone but their stupid selves for their fail.
As someone mentioned on another thread, the big winners from this ‘set-up to fail referendum’ will be the Greens & Indies. This referendum result is democracy in action. I think each election should be seen as a chance to place a referendum question before the public.
Trev,
What complete and utter conspiracy bullshit!!!!
Well put Michael and,Fred . That’s a strange thing to say when there is so much of his first term still to serve. And another thing l would say is that l’m yet to hear a commentator put the truth of the result in written word or truthful voice.
The following image woke me at about 2 this morning (and this time I’m glad there was a notepad and biro next to the bed):
A huge jackbooted NO! with a sledgehammer slung across its back. In one hand it holds a length of chain with a wrecking ball at the end and in the other it grips a human figure by the neck. The figure says in a fading whisper, with the last few letters of “speak…” breaking through the voice bubble, and falling to the ground , “I have a voice and I want to speak…”
Very well put John Lord.
What a sad result!
It should show Albo, despite an excellent speech two weeks too late, that honest and positive are no match for deceit and negative.
Even sadder, unless he attacks littletobeproudof and dumbton he will go the way of one attack Gillard, nothing from what’shisname. I think more and be one termed.
So Albo and plibersek forget this thrashing and get the whips out or join little Billy and let new blood in.
“A leader with any character would slap down” is true but refers to Albo who must find the “character” to “slap down” the opposition LNP and the Loonies.
There used to be a labor woman here who often ‘slapped’ me down over my attempts to get gillard and little billy to get on the morning shows and slap down the rabbott whom his party slapped down. I wonder if she saw plibersek last monday on sunrise??
Who is game enough to watch insiders???
ps
dance of the cuckoo, the picture on ABC was a jubilant, power fists into the air Aboriginal man.
The voice could not deliver such power making Dutton’s no a lie but the no could deliver power and that is the aim of price and mundine.
I do not want to hear about Australian mateship or how generous Australians are for some time.
First Nations people must be feeling like outcasts in their own country.So sad.
Australia is where democracy dies and billionaire miners and Murdoch live and rule.
Lest we forget has been forgotten just like a fair go.
What did it achieve:
It has demonstrated so very clearly to the entire world what a racist nation we truly are.
Price is kidding herself if she thinks there’s any chance for a national level Treaty after this, or if she expects any support for Treaty on any level from her fellow travellers.
And, if she truly believes that garbage she blithered out a little while back about there being only advantages for Aboriginal people post-invasion, WTF need is there for Treaty?
Fred, Trev:
Oh, sod off! What a load of unmitigated cobblers. It’s time you emerged from your rabbiit holes and joined the real world.
“We here” have a voice and can exercise that, as does someone scribbling for a few defectives here, who utter triumphal and conspiratorial rubbish of no truth or value. It seemed doomed to fail as it challenged the hearts, minds and souls of voters who usually fail by any standards of decency, and superstition of the religious kind often allies with deep neurotic suspicion. Lucky Country, you might reflect, was a term of bitter irony, a sick joke. We do have it “good”, so let’s be selfishly brainless, Yeah? Nah?
I see Price is now claiming that we aren’t a racist country…what planet does she live on?
https://www.news.com.au/national/voice-referendum-jacinta-nampijinpa-price-is-real-winner-of-the-vote-as-she-becomes-major-political-star/news-story/df9fc4ba616449eed553dbc14c4fd4ba
Any suggestion to improve first nations peoples lives coming from the No side now, should rightfully be ignored, and most likely will be.
Also, the next Federal Election if Labor wants any chance to get a second term (Forget current polls.). ONLY need to, and should ONLY talk about how bad Dutton and the Libs will be. Aka “Don’t Risk Dutton”. Aka “Libs gave us Morrison to save us from Dutton”.
This country doesn’t deserve vision, won’t understand it, don’t understand policies anyway. Fear especially justified regarding these Libs will work.
Next election Labor, don’t bother with policy talk. The masses are too stupid to understand them.
Did anyone who voted NO actually read the papers leading up to uluru statement of the heart and then the actual uluru statement of the heart? That’s what I want to know. If you had there would have been no confusion, it was very very clear how simplistic the request was. The first nations people wanted to be recognized, that’s it, but the fear that that request would be heavily politicized (oh the irony) so they wanted to be allowed a ‘voice in parliament’ to also be acknowledge so no future governments could go back to ignoring them, like the current systems are.
That was it guys, recognition + the right to speak up about concerns relating to them. Rights, i’ll point out, that we have & utilize because it’s in the constitution, rights they DO NOT HAVE because they’re not even in the constitution let alone it spelled out they can speak up. I mean come on, that was it, to be legally allowed to express concern just like us, that was the voice, nothing else, nothing sinister. They wanted equal rights like us.
Shame on every one of you who voted NO yet never put the effort in to read the source, the statement made by the first nation people, which would have taken you less time than to drink a cup of coffee to read it and even less to GET IT, get what this was about. Instead, you were lazy and uncaring. The no voters let one hell of a radical negative media campaign to fool you. congrats, you won the superiority race, did you gain anything from your win?
None of you NO voters get to judge and sneer at trump supporters, or whine about inequality gender imbalances moving forward because you got sucked in just like them and you just dished out the biggest serving of inequality this country has ever experienced. You’ve allowed a whole group of women, men, children and non-binaries to go on without rights you take for granted slow clap well done.
This was the foulest level of negative radical press I have ever witnessed in this country.
I live in a town that has a large thriving first nation people population and the division this NO vote has caused is real, it’s painful to watch.
You gained nothing from voting no, it was selfless to vote yes.
I wonder; if Der Spud had been in charge would Rupert, Costello, Stokes, and other assorted RWNJ’s be screaming for his head and demanding that he resign if the referendum had gone the same way?
Hm, nah…they would have blamed Labor for the loss.
I read the ‘ULURU STATEMENT FROM THE HEART’ as it appears in Document 14, page 87 (87-112) released under FOI request made to the National Indigenous Australians Agency. It is misinfo-disinfo to say the referendum was seeking a simple request for recognition based on a one page document when document 14 alone runs pages 87-112.
The fact is that recognition was one of 3 things to be achieved, the other 2 are truth-telling and treaty.
Megan Davis, a Vice-Chair of the United Nations Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, in an interview with UQ Magazine said “After decades of Aboriginal advocacy for constitutional reform, we were able to come up with a consensus law reform proposal for the Referendum Council. That framework is what we call ‘Voice, Treaty, Truth’. https://stories.uq.edu.au/contact-magazine/2020/voice-treaty-truth/index.html
In respect to ‘Truth-telling’, Megan had this to say: “The need for the truth to be told as part of the process of reform emerged from many of the Dialogues. . . A truth commission could be established as part of any reform, for example, prior to a constitutional reform or as part of a Treaty negotiation.”
The YES campaign initially tried to hide the Truth-telling and Treaty aspects as being integral to The Voice and that deceit resulted in some people voting NO.
When a treaty process begins, one thing I’d like to see is transparency, ie. no behind doors ‘Commercial-in-confidence’ deals hidden from the public. The calculation of reparations and the text of the treaty must be made available for public feedback. Meanwhile, how about if Aus exits the UN, WHO & WEF?
Start exiting, Trev, starting here, leading the way. Everything to be exited…have a nice exit.
Thanks Phil, good advice, leading by example – first a trickle, then a flood 🙂
Those millions of Australians who had no effing idea what was in the Constitution are rejoicing that it’s been untouched. 🤷🏻♂️
I think that Price is very annoyed that a lot of Indigenous people voted yes at the referendum and has to resort to almost childish tactics of trying to blame the AEC for this occurrence.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/oct/15/jacinta-nampijinpa-price-questions-aec-conduct-after-largely-indigenous-communities-vote-yes
In a single day Indigenous people have been cast away as if they were no one. of any importance.
In 140 years after 1788,our Indigenous people’s population collapsed from 750/0ne million to but 6-8% of 1788 levels – a mere 60,000.
In The Australian Friday 13/10/2023 the Editorial wrote:
“As a newspaper that has championed Indigenous rights for many decades we do not believe a No vote can be interpreted as a reflection of community ill-will towards Indigenous people. Rather, it will be a result of government failure to adequately consult and deliver bipartisan support for a workable model.”
Wonderful clarity of thinking. Just like the wonderful thinking of the No case in the Referendum Booklet, and the inability of the Coalition to compose suitable questions in parliament Question Time.
And failure to offer bipartisan support, but to deliberately set out to oppose the Labor position. And to set out with all kinds of lies and disinformation and misinformation. And to demand more and more unnecessary details, refusing to understand what Linda Burney was saying. These tactics are very much the method of the Murdoch empire.
Find out about the “fabrication of Aboriginal history” written by Keith Windschuttle about deaths of Aboriginal people, which he claims amounted only to 118 between 1803 and 1847.
Robert Manne’s “Whitewash” (2003) destroyed the claims.
Murdoch promoted Windschuttle’s book.
In 1996 John Howard wanted Australians to be “relaxed and comfortable” and opposed the Black Armband idea of history, And there was Howard’s intervention in the Northern Territory.
“In May, 2014, the Indigenous Advancement Strategy was announced. This ‘consolidated’ all items and activities that had been moved into the Prime Minister’s Department and cut $534.44 million from the Indigenous programs. grants and activities.” Thank you, Tony Abbott. (Megan Davis and George Williams, “Everything You Need To Know About The Voice”, p.105))
Murdoch has quite a bit to pay for his self-confessed lying. That is why he is pretending to have stepped down from CEO of the company. See also the role of Lachlan in the Voice discussions here in Australia. (See Shane Dowling, Kangaroo Court of Australia,))
@ Terence Mills: ”Some see Treaty as a Bill of Rights, others as a cargo-cult for returning land and sovereignty to traditional owners with punitive reparations on settlers.”
When in doubt, follow the money. THAT has been the case for the NOtional$ Debit Card idea costing about $10,000 per year per person and to be paid to former NOtional$ pollies. THAT has been the strategy reported for the Mundine proposal to evict Aboriginal families from the Block in Redfern, demolish the buildings and replace the houses with high rise student accommodation.
The huge ”No” vote in New England (about 73% ”No”) confirmed the opinion of many thinking Australian voters that Beetrooter, with his adultery, alcoholism, sexual harassment & misogyny is one of the ”smart residents” in the electorate ….. that sees itself as a 19th century theme park ….. looking forward by standing with its legs apart, putting their heads between their knees and looking up.
Albanese did as he pledged to, sought to implement the Uluru Statement of the Heart in full. Labor & the YES campaign made a botch of it, underestimating the wreckage by the naysayers.
I shall never forget or forgive Dutton, Price or Mundine and their shadowy cabal for politicizing it purely for their own pecuniary interests, spreading lies, misdirections, disinformation and fear across the ignorant, lines and excuses to sanctify the greedy, and a platform for haters and racists. Nor shall I forget how the LNP scurried in the dark across the country running cooker programs. They have severely damaged our political process and our democratic project.
Oz was once a paradise. Now it is a land abused by fools.
Sadly we retain dregs of colonial tradition & law, brutal bastardry continues, at great cost to indigenous, and a now reinforced shadow of shame and racism over our international reputation.
Albanese’s speech was good – he accepted responsibility. It will require continuing hard work to devise other means of consultation to ‘close the gap’, hard work from which Albo and Labor do not resile.
That POS Dutton of course offered zip. Just tried to take skin off Albo with the utterance of yet another lie.
Labor & the YES campaign made a botch of it
Clakka, Labor did not run the YES23 campaign, it was independent of party politics as was the intent of the referendum. It is entirely a media beat up to blame Labor for the failure this was in the hands of the Australian people from the very beginning.
Personally, as I’ve said many times before, I would have first legislated the Voice, allowed it to settle and iron out the wrinkles and then when it’s fully up and running, within three to five years, hold a referendum to entrench it if considered necessary.
Terrence:
A referendum to entrench it is essential, or as soon as the next LNP government gets in they will eliminate it the same way they did ATSIC.
leefe,
“A referendum to entrench it is essential”
No, that really is not true. A referendum to entrench it is an unnecessary luxury that could turn out to be ultimately detrimental. If the voice is worthwhile and the voting public can see that it is working effectively then subsequent governments that did not have electoral permission to abolish the voice would have to do so at their peril. No referendum or constitutional change was or is needed to approve the voice. I had expected the Albanese government to quickly legislate the voice as a priority directly after it took office, but I hadn’t realised back then how awful a PM Mr Albanese would turn out to be. Mind you, it didn’t take long. Toto could have done a better job establishing the voice than Anthony.
But incredibly this referendum wasn’t about approval to establish the voice. It was about making the voice a constitutionally endorsed inherited privilege, conditional upon constitutionally binding recognition of the recipients of that hereditary privilege being (exclusively) recognised as the First Peoples of Australia. Try to think about the consequences of that.
Quite apart from setting a precedent to require the hurdle of a costly referendum to be overcome before any other future requests for a voice to Parliament can be approved, the Australian People were asked to divide themselves into a constitutionally binding and hereditary class system, or maybe caste system is a more appropriate term. The First Peoples who have a voice to air their grievences to Parliament and the Colonial Invaders and their followers who don’t. Why not instead, ask us to recognise a truth that unites all of us, that no humans were ever indigenous to Australia? We all originated from somewhere else, that somewhere else being Africa. Every last one of us.
Think of the disunity that a Yes vote would have achieved. How can anyone not have noticed what the referendum was clearly asking us to endorse? How can anyone pretend that a Yes vote would have united us when it is so obvious that it would divide us? And why do we blindly assume that Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders are even remotely descended from the First Peoples of Australia who may not even have survived very long before being displaced by later comers or that they are the only people so disadvantaged that they alone are deserving of a voice?
Come to think of it, who actually came first? The Aborigines or the Torres Strait Islanders? Why were we asked to recognise both as the first comers? Is there any dispute over the status of who came first? Does no one have any hard dates that could settle this matter? Maybe the mysterious Gwion Gwion people (the First Artists?) who inhabited and then just disappeared from the Kimberly region were the real First Peoples of Australia. But who in Australia gives a stuff about them or the neglected cultural heritage they left us? Would recognition of this uncelebrated culture pose a threat to Native Title Claims? I can’t see how or why, but I suppose it might provide a motive for why they are seeking binding constitutional recognition as the First Peoples.
Can we all please make a genuine effort to understand the true history of this land instead of promoting myths for the sake of shallow, political expediency? It is a simple, cynical fact. We have to know the truth before we can assent to recognise it.
Sully:
You live in a fantasy land. Howard had neither qualms nor difficulty white-anting and then abolishing ATSIC. The same has happened every time legislation alone has set up a similar body. If it’s in the Constitution the government of the day cannot eliminate it so easily.
The real history of this land? And you know it, while the majority of academics and researchers in the field do not? Or do you cling to what gives your racism against Aboriginal people and culture some validity?
There are no consequences for you or me, Constitutionally or otherwise. Or do you not only know more about history but also Constitutional law as well, and can see possibilities that Constitutional legal experts have insisted do not exist?
Frankly, you can take your arrogant, paranoid, privileged, racist rantings and forcibly place them in a location permanently bereft of solar illumination. I no longer have the patiience to deal with you.
leefe
One of the reasons that the referendum failed was that there was insufficient information on the detail of the Voice. We were told that the details would be sorted out in the form of legislation passed by our parliament once the referendum had passed. So, the model presented was based on a prospective legislated outcome.
The only thing that was being entrenched in the Constitution was the principle that there should be a Voice. Any future government could alter, amend, neuter or enhance that voice.
B Sullivan is correct, there was no practical need for the Voice to be constitutionally entrenched.
Terence,
Thanks for your clarity. I am well aware of the matters Labor v ‘YES’ campaign. Labor were however, responsible for the preliminary matters, manner and timing of its introduction as sponsors of the referendum in the parliament, and introduced the enabling legislation, and argued for it in parliament.
I opened my comment with “Albanese did as he pledged to, sought to implement the Uluru Statement of the Heart in full.” , and I respect that. I am not the media, and don’t ascribe to ” … media beat up to blame Labor … “, and have not said I blame them.
I have included Labor in ” … underestimating the wreckage of the naysayers.” I have also said “I shall never forget or forgive Dutton, Price or Mundine and their shadowy cabal for politicizing it … “. To the extent that Labor had the ‘political’ task of carriage of their policy through parliament and bringing it to success, I believe their strategy was rushed and deficient, especially given the background of the LNP’s response (or lack of response) over the years to the Uluru Statement and the Co-Design reports, to that extent imho it was botched.
As expected, Dutton and Price’s post referendum speeches were ungracious, divisive and political. I note in Albanese’s fine post-referendum speech, he graciously said ” … we argued for this change, not out of convenience, but out of conviction”, and ” … when you aim high, sometimes you fall short” that ” … we must now seek a new way forward.”, and that he ” … accepts full reponsibility … “. I’m sure people will parse Albanese’s words as they see fit.
With it in the Constitution it cannot be abolished. That is important.
As for detail, just how much did you want? We know how many members the proposed model has, we know how many are urban, how many rural, how many remote. We know they will be elected by the ATSI residents of the areas they represent. We know that there will be a balance of ages and genders, even if we don’t know how that will be achieved.
It didn’t fail because there was an actual lack of information about all this, but because most of the media pushed the NO campaign’s insistence that ‘there’s not enough detail’, despite being given all the detail they asked for. It failed because Dutto et al politicised it and ran a Trumpian scare campaign. It failed because scare campaigns and divisiveness and appeals to privilege work. It failed because lying loudly and often enough is effective.
The reason it was put forward for The Voice to be put in the Constitution,was that is what First Nations People asked for us part of The Uluru Statement From The Heart.
Anthony Albanese and Labor chose to listen in full,unlike others. They chose NOT to “cherry pick” what to listen to,but instead fully listen,and try to pass this wish in full.
Take from the link above:-
“We call for the establishment of a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution.”
Also, those people that called for exact details on how The Voice to Parliament would work,do NOT understand how parliamentary system works,and how our Constitution is.
Parliament would of decided on all the exact details,of how The Voice would work. Just like every policy ever.We get told what a policy would be,then Parliament decides all the exact details. It would of been a LIE to include exact details in the Referendum,for numerous reasons egs: They would be subject to Parliament,so would most likely change from what exactly we would be told now.Plus,exact details are NOT included in the Constitution.
leefe
The so called ‘details’ (the mechanics of operating the Voice) were not known to anyone and would only have been thrashed out by legislation in our parliament after a successful referendum.
You may be referring to the Calma/Langton report as the proposed model but this only gave a suggested basis for the Voice and was never adopted by the government or the parliament so it was only ever a template upon which legislation could be based. There was a reason why the government didn’t sign off on Calma/Langton, they didn’t want to constrain themselves or the parliament when it came to legislating the Voice.
Wayne Turner (above) understands the processes involved.
B,Sulliivan @oCT 16
There is so much to examine, it would take too long – the ability of PM Albanese, cost, disunity (Yes or No) , etc, always something different, so many experts.
And this little gem: “No humans were ever Indigenous to Australia”.
And: :”Why do we blindly assume that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander are even remotely descended from the First Peoples of Australia who may not have survived very long before being replaced by later comers or that they are the only people so disadvantaged that they alone are deserving of a voice.”
And so you ask, “Can we all please make a genuine effort to understand the true history of this land…?”
Yes please. So many books available.
Billy Griffiths, “Deep Time Dreaming: Uncovering Ancient Australia”
Peter Sutton and Keryn Walshe,”Farmers or Hunter Gatherers? The Dark Emu Debate.”
Josephine Flood, “The Original Australians: The Story of the Aboriginal People,”
Yeah, I’d have thought that 65,000 years occupation (and potentially more) was long enough to qualify as indigenous. But apparently not by Sully”s logic, and Homo supposedlysapiens therefore isn’t indigenous to any continent except Africa because that’s where the species evolved.
We must not forget the Constitution can be changed …. by referendum, so what is done in the Constitution can be undone.
Most referenda fail because of bloody-minded politicization. Just like for the one we’ve just had.
For all those many of us that want to be rid of the Crown and become a Republic, that has already been spoiled by politicization, but now, the chances of carrying it and redrafting the entire Constitution has apparently been obliterated maybe for generations to come.
When will we stop being slaves to the appalling weasel-words, greed, beguilements, bigotry and brutality of the colonial era, and the foundational garbage in our Constitution? When will we ever grow up?
“When will we ever grow up?”
Starts singing The Twelfth of Never