James Campbell: Why Voice opponents can’t believe their luck

The Voice’s opponents can’t believe their luck. Anthony Albanese and the working group have handed them a miracle weapon with the Liberals soon to drop their pretence on what side they will land.

Looking through JWS Research’s recent survey into how things are going on the Voice front, it’s hard not to feel a bit scared for those who have the job of trying to convince a majority of Australians in a majority of states to vote Yes in the referendum later this year.

The good news is that since August, the percentage of people saying they plan to vote Yes is still greater than the percentage who say they will vote No.

Unfortunately, that’s where the good news for Voice fans ends if JWS Research’s deep dive into how we are feeling about it is even close to being right.

Because while the Yes vote has more or less held steady, down from 43 per cent to 42 per cent since August, it’s still nowhere near a majority. And while, at 28 per cent, the proportion of people who are flat out opposed to it is still a lot smaller, it’s rising fast, and is now five percentage points higher than it was back in August.

Voice fans can console themselves that if you add in those people across the country who are saying they are leaning towards supporting it, the Yes vote rises to 51 per cent.

But getting a straight majority won’t be enough to change the Constitution. The Voice also needs the support of a majority of voters in a majority of states. And at the moment the Yes case has a majority – including leaning voters – only in NSW (52 per cent) and Victoria (54 per cent). In Western Australia it is at 50-50, and it is behind in Queensland (48 per cent) and South Australia (46 per cent). Tasmania wasn’t included in the survey.

Surprisingly, well surprisingly anyway for those of us who are already sick to death of the subject, 30 per cent of people answered “can’t say or need more information” when asked how they feel about it.

Marcia Langton and members of the Referendum Working Group with Anthony Albanese at Parliament House. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Equally surprisingly, though these proportions had all fallen from August, in February, nine per cent of people said they’d never heard of it, 26 per cent said they’d heard of it but don’t understand it, and exactly half said they knew little about it.

However, the thing that should be scaring the Yes case is that these results have come at the end of a six-month period in which the Liberal Party is still – in theory anyway – open to supporting it.

Not only has the government been pumping up its tyres, it’s had positive coverage from most of the media, and corporate Australia has also been smiling on it.

In other words, almost all the traffic has been going its way.

The JWS Research survey is explicit on this point: of the people who say they could definitely or maybe remember being exposed to information, ads, media or social media about the Voice, roughly half said it was mainly related to supporting it and only six per cent said it was mainly negative.

Whatever else happens in the next six months, you can be certain that even with the positive spin most of the media are likely to put on it, it is inevitable more people are going to be exposed to more arguments that are designed to persuade them to vote No. This isn’t just because at some point soon Peter Dutton and the Liberal Party will end the pretence they haven’t made up their minds and will come out against it.

Any remote chance this won’t happen ended last week when Anthony Albanese decided to back the government’s working group, which had made it clear it was adamantly opposed to parliament being given the power to define the circumstances in which courts can intervene on the Voice’s behalf.

Late last month, group member Marcia Langton, who was standing alongside the Prime Minister when he unveiled the final wording of the referendum question, was asked by the ABC about claims government decisions might be challenged in the High Court “and potentially stopped from being implemented” until the Voice had been heard.

Langton couldn’t have been clearer in her response: “That is a possibility, and why would we not want that to be the case?” Might not that lead to delays in decision making? “If nothing that the Voice says is subject to the ordinary laws of Australia – in other words it’s completely gutted and has no standing, if you like – then the government can ignore all of the Voice’s decisions with impunity” – in other words, “a toothless tiger that can be ignored at all times”.

There’s no way in hell the Liberal Party is going to sign for a body whose “decisions” – Langton’s word, not mine – could be enforced by the courts. The problem for those tasked with selling it is that before Langton made it explicit that Voice-related court cases will not be a bug but a feature of life in Australia going forward, only 39 per cent of the people surveyed agreed it “will not interfere with the established parliamentary hierarchy – it will provide advice but will have no program delivery function or any veto power on government decisions”. The Voice’s opponents can’t believe their luck. Albo and the working group have handed them a miracle weapon.

JAMES CAMPBELL’S WIFE ROSHENA IS A LIBERAL CANDIDATE IN THE BY ELECTION IN THE VICTORIAN SEAT OF ASTON