Voice far from won outside centre-left bubble

Anthony Albanese attends the first meeting of the Referendum Working Group in September, alongside co-chairs Special Envoy Patrick Dodson and Indigenous Affairs Minister Linda Burney, and Assistant Minister for Indigenous Health Malarndirri McCarthy, right. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

The most profound philosophical statement to emerge from the great state of Victoria runs: “The third quarter is the premiership quarter.” This is the point where a football team decides to win or lose.

Unfortunately, a referendum is not a football game. Instead, the first quarter is the premiership quarter. Stuff it up early and you will be stuffed at the end.

Supporters of the Indigenous voice should contemplate the grim example of the 1999 referendum on a republic.

All the things that ultimately killed it were present from day one. The republican movement was always seen as elitist. There was deep division between different species of republicans. The whole campaign was plagued by faulty assumptions and poor political intellig­ence.

Worst, the campaign for a repub­lic was launched and died facing intractable partisan opposition.

Wisely, Anthony Albanese has now called quarter time in the voice debate. By saying the referendum will be held during the 2023-24 financial year, he has extended the potential timeline for both the referendum and careful reflection. Now is the point to pause and think, particularly about existing challenges inside the voice campaign.

Most concerning is the line of thought that the voice does not need bipartisan support to win.

Tactically, this makes the battle of the Somme look a brilliant success. It is deeply frustrating to repeat endlessly that no referendum has won without bipartisan support. The invariable response is that this will be a “special referendum” or it will repeat the pattern of the same-sex marriage plebiscite, where people voted in support of people they knew and loved. The romanticism around a special referendum is sadly misplaced. Everybody thinks their referendum is special until it is blown out of the water on polling day.

This referendum is indeed special in its drive for justice and recognition, but not as an exemption from invariable referendum politics. As to the marriage plebiscite, there is a huge and obvious difference. That proposal was never put through the mashing jaws of popular constitutional politics that have already killed 36 out of 44 referendums.

As an iron rule, constitutional proposals – like the republic and the voice – hit their high point in the polls well before the referendum campaigns begin. They then sink as they face complicated, highly charged, merciless No cases. You just pray they do not fall below 50 per cent.

The current Yes vote predicted in various media outlets is based on the shifting sands of public unawareness. The claim is – after careful statistical manipulation – that about 60 per cent of voters support the voice. But the fact less than 10 per cent of people say they understand the proposal is frankly terrifying.

Fundamentally, what all this shows is a great general goodwill towards our First Australians.

But it will be a high-stakes gamble that this goodwill will be enough to secure a double majority in the face of a virulent referendum campaign.

Then there was yet another poll showing chronic division over what the voice should do. Roughly a quarter wanted the voice to be able to look at anything, a quarter wanted it confined to Indigenous affairs, a quarter did not want a voice at all, and the final quarter were undecided. It is the republic all over.

Of course, there is the pious hope there will be no Coalition-led partisan campaign against the voice. This is just dangerous, wishful thinking. Peter Dutton has studiously avoided stating a final position. All options are open.

No matter how irritating, it is for proponents of the voice to answer the Opposition Leader’s questions because they certainly will be the same questions worrying the electorate. What is the voice? How will it help? These are important public policy questions that need a clearer answer before the parliament voting to go to a referendum, or the public being asked to cast their ballot.

Many hope desperately for a conscience vote within the Coalition, which would be the right Liberal outcome. Members of parliament supporting the voice typically begin from a deep moral conviction and should not be forced to violate their conscience.

But there will be some in the party room cynically telling Dutton not only that the voice is wrong but this is his big break in key battlegrounds the Coalition needs to win back at the next election. The government has closely identified itself with the voice, which makes the proposal a natural political target.

In these circumstances, we of the voice must be working across the parliament and doing everything possible to win the undecided, uninformed and unconvinced. Above all, we must avoid the coalescence of monolithic conservative opposition.

The two come to the same thing: caution, consideration, inclusion and timing.

The Prime Minister’s opening bid words cannot be just anointed. There are other models that should be considered. Above all, that consideration must centrally include the ability of any set of words to win a referendum. The best words in the world will be no comfort after a lost vote.

We know, for example, that the current broad proposal for the voice to consider past and proposed legislative and executive action is very unlikely to gain bipartisan conservative support. It goes way beyond the original idea of a voice vetting new laws. Why pick a fight with reality?

If other options are to be considered, you need a process and a certain amount of time. The Prime Minister has opened the possibility of more time. We should use it wisely to produce a proposal as bombproof as possible in achieving the double majority necessary to win.

A huge challenge for supporters of the voice is to get outside the comforting centre-left bubble where everyone supports the idea, and all that remains is to plan the victory parade and the podium.

They need to understand it is a fiction that no decent person would vote No in the privacy of the ballot box. They will, through different political values, constitutional suppositions or overriding caution. Or they will vote No out of uncertainty, confusion or the condescension of Yes campaigners.

This is the time to win people to the voice, with the right model, the right process, the right timing and the right political equation. Otherwise, the right side of history will be very bleak.

Greg Craven is a constitutional lawyer and a member of the constitutional expert panel advising on the Indigenous voice.