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Parliament on Monday finally passed legislation to enable the Australian people to vote later this year in a referendum to change our Constitution. I now look forward to discussion devoid of the political posturing that has poisoned the process so far, because this referendum belongs to the Australian people, not to politicians.
It was to the people that the convention of First Peoples at Uluru more than six years ago addressed the invitation to walk together for a better future. Those who signed the Uluru Statement wanted the Australian people, not politicians, to decide whether the Voice should be enshrined in the Constitution and not to be just a creature of legislation.
Applause from Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians and Assistant Minister for Indigenous Health Malarndirri McCarthy and Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong after the Constitution Alteration (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice) passed the Senate. Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
The language of the Uluru Statement from the Heart was reasonable and respectful. It is my earnest hope that those qualities will characterise public discussion and debate over the next few months. Moderation should be the hallmark.
But, if the arguments of those opposed to a Voice follow the style and manner of those arguments we heard during the parliamentary debate on the Constitution Amendment Bill over the past fortnight, we can expect a shower of misinformation and misrepresentation. We had warnings of that scenario through the baiting questions of shadow attorney-general Michaelia Cash as the bill bumped through the committee stages in the Senate last Friday night and Saturday morning.
I hope that social media platforms, especially, will deploy maximum resources to monitor malignant material. Unfortunately, there will be no such sanction over the pamphlet which will outline arguments for and against the referendum question, and which the Australian Electoral Commission will post to every voter. Labor reluctantly agreed to the pamphlet in a vain attempt to win Coalition support for the referendum.
The Yes and No camps now have four weeks to produce the cases they want included in the pamphlet. About a month after that, the Governor-General will issue a writ which will nominate a Saturday when the referendum will be held – within six months from now, but not earlier than 33 days after the issue of the writ. Come voting day, all electors will be required to write Yes or No on their ballot paper.
There are three elements critical to understanding this referendum. Firstly, it is about belated recognition of Australia’s First Peoples. Secondly, it is about establishing a voice through which First Peoples can make representations to the parliament and the government. Thirdly, the parliament will quite rightly determine the composition, functions, powers and procedures of the Voice. Parliament will have authority over what the Voice can and cannot do.
As a representative, gender-balanced body, the Voice will be much more than a symbol of recognition. Its representations and any parliamentary or government responses (or lack of them) to those representations will be recognition at work; its permanence, guaranteed by the Constitution, will signify an enduring recognition endorsed by the Australian people in a successful referendum.
A Voice is a fundamental request of the Uluru Statement, and an essential element in the new constitutional provision. To shrink from its promotion as part of the referendum would sell First Peoples short. It will be their vehicle through which they want to interact with the parliament and the government, and for which they are seeking the public’s support.
First Peoples have not had a truly national voice since the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) was abolished nearly two decades ago. It suits the opponents of the Voice to vilify ATSIC and wrongly accuse it of corruption, but its strengths were never fully realised, especially its local and regional footing.
The Voice, too, will have local and regional connections, giving local communities a real say in their future, and giving young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in particular the opportunity to participate in a new community-led political process.
We need to make sure that all our young people are engaged in the debates and civic education programs that will roll out over the next few months – because, while the polls show young people are most likely to support a Yes vote, they also show that that cohort tends to know the least about what is proposed.
A successful referendum offers much hope. A negative result would doubtlessly be celebrated by the No voters, but they will have to live with the legacy bequeathed to our children and generations beyond. First Peoples would remain unrecognised in the Constitution and denied a permanent voice to the parliament and government.
A momentous reckoning lies ahead.
Patrick Dodson is a Labor senator for Western Australia.
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