Peta Credlin: Beware this trojan horse Voice

Last week’s theatrical exit of Senator Lidia Thorpe from the Greens might have done the whole country a favour, writes Peta Credlin.

Last week’s theatrical exit of Senator Lidia Thorpe from the Greens might have done the whole country a favour – not because the Greens will be any better without her, or the parliament any better with her on the cross bench, but because she’s put up in flashing neon lights what this Voice referendum is all about.

It’s all about “sovereignty” in her words, or – in plain language – about who really owns Australia.

Thorpe is AGAINST the Voice because she thinks including an indigenous Voice in what she calls the “colonial” constitution risks making a concession that sovereignty was ceded from 1788 and what she is really after is co-governance and perhaps in the end, even a separate country (funded of course from reparations the rest of us will pay for the sins of our forebears).

The rest of the Greens are FOR the Voice because, as their leader Adam Bandt confirmed last week, they’ve had assurances from the government that the Voice won’t disturb Aboriginal people’s ongoing sovereignty and that the first agenda item for the Voice isn’t fixing the crisis in Alice Springs but instead a whole series of treaties between the Australian Government and the hundreds and hundreds of separate, so-called First Nations.

(You want to know why we suddenly moved from ‘indigenous Australians’ to the term ‘First Nations’? This is why. It was the activist class moving the language ahead of the laws because a treaty is only nation-to-nation, even if First Nations are nothing of the sort).

Senator Thorpe’s exit from the Greens might have done the whole country a favour.

I bet this is all news to the vast majority of voters, who’ve repeatedly been assured by the PM that this Voice is no big deal; it’s just politely including indigenous people in the constitution for the first time and agreeing to listen to them.

It’s actually so much more than that, and that’s why Albanese is refusing to give you thefull details.

Labor’s Voice, that you’ll have to vote on later this year, is not about just recognising that Aboriginal people were here first.

It’s about establishing an indigenous Voice with a right to advise the government and the parliament on any topic at all. The High Court will be able to sit in judgement on whether the Voice has been given an adequate opportunity to produce that advice and whether the government has adequately responded to it. And as the PM himself has conceded, only a “brave” government would be able to ignore the Voice’s advice.

As the PM has repeatedly declared, his government is committed to implementing the Uluru Statement from the Heart “IN FULL”. That statement declares that sovereignty was never conceded and doesn’t just seek the establishment of a Voice. It also demands the negotiation of treaties between the government and sovereign “First Nations” plus the establishment of a “truth telling” commission, presumably to tell the “real history” of post-1788 Australia.

I encourage everyone to google the Uluru Statement and read it themselves.

Unbeknownst to most of us, ‘Voice, Treaty and Truth’ has been bubbling away for years within indigenous activist groups and was merely codified in the Uluru statement. As early as 1982, the National Aboriginal Conference declared that sovereignty required the eventual establishment of “Aboriginal states” that would evolve into “separate nations”.

Those who believe in constitutional equality must say a resounding “no” to this activists’ Trojan horse Voice.

To the radical activist groups that Senator Thorpe now says she’s going to represent in the parliament, the objective is not more effective programmes to address indigenous disadvantage but the establishment of a politically separate race of people and the eventual break up of Australia.

And wittingly or not, the Albanese government is softening us up for this by opening every official occasion with an acknowledgement that the relevant “country” belongs to just some of us rather than to all of us; and by almost everywhere flying the Aboriginal flag co-equally with the National Flag.

That’s why the establishment of a Voice, should a referendum pass, will swiftly lead to the end of Australia Day, the re-writing of history, and the negotiation of treaties that will inevitably include provisions for financial compensation to indigenous groups over and above the $30 billion a year that the Productivity Commission estimates the federal government currently spends on indigenous-specific programmes. Eventually, there will be demands for autonomy for Aboriginal “nations” on the path to some sort of independence.

As things stand, Australians who believe in constitutional equality must say a resounding “no” to this activists’ trojan horse Voice.

COST OF LIVING TO DECIDE MORTGAGE BELT BY-ELECTION

The coming Aston by-election in Victoria, triggered by Alan Tudge’s resignation, is as much a test for the government as the opposition. And if the Liberals were smart they’d make it a referendum on cost of living and Labor’s broken promises. That’s because for 95 per cent of voters, cost of living is the only issue that keeps them up at night.

At the election last year, the Albanese government made two big promises. First, that it would cut household electricity bills by $275 dollars. And second, that it would raise real wages. Since the election, energy bills have continued to go up and up – with even the government’s own budget forecasting a 40 per cent increase in gas bills, and a 56 per cent increase in electricity bills.

And the government’s climate-obsessed, renewables drive will make a bad situation worse – as consumers are forced to pay for 40 new wind turbines every month, and 22,000 new solar panels every day, and 28,000 kilometres of new transmission lines over the next eight years.

And with inflation at 7 per cent plus, there’s no way real wages will grow, any time soon. Add in the government’s pay off to their union mates, via industry-wide bargaining and industry-wide strikes, and there’s economic head-winds ahead without a doubt.

The coming Aston by-election in Victoria, triggered by Alan Tudge’s resignation, is as much a test for the government as the opposition.

Throughout this looming by-election campaign, when voters will want the focus on them, don’t forget the PM will be pushing his Indigenous Voice and that’s not going to win him votes in Aston. This is mortgage belt Melbourne not the ABC’s Q&A audience.

You have to go back over 100 years, to 1920, to find an occasion where the Opposition lost a by-election race to the government. But don’t think it can’t happen. Just look at the performance of the Victorian Libs up against Daniel Andrews last year.

Liberal frontbenchers, such as Dan Tehan and Simon Birmingham are demanding a woman be chosen to replace Tudge. But forget gender gents, it’s the quality of the candidate that counts.

A factional hack is not going to hold the seat for the Liberals, even if she wears a dress. Meaning the surest way they can stuff this up is to install a candidate that doesn’t, and can’t, resonate with the sort of aspirational families that make up Aston.

I recall two by-elections happening shortly after Tony Abbott unexpectedly became opposition leader, in 2009. Back then Kevin Rudd was riding high, best ever Newspoll numbers for a PM, but Abbott said we would win if we took the fight up to the government.

We did and we won both seats, including one in Victoria.

Plenty of lessons there if the Liberals are listening.

Watch Peta on Credlin on Sky News, weeknights at 6pm

Originally published as Peta Credlin: Beware this trojan horse Voice