Why Peter Dutton is right to fly one flag for unity

There is only one flag protected by its own special act of parliament, and that’s our national flag.

In politics, there is what Canberra talks about and then there is what the electorate picks up. Sometimes they are one and the same thing, but often they’re not. That’s because unless the modern politician works hard at keeping their feet on the ground and their ears listening (as opposed to their jaws flapping), there can be a real disconnect between what our leaders think is important and what we care about, what we talk about and what motivates our vote.

The same is true of the media and the elites that run our big businesses, cultural institutions and sporting organisations.

On Monday night on my show, I said to Peter Dutton I’d noticed he stands in front of only one flag at his press conferences. I then asked him, if he wins the upcoming election, would he continue that practice as PM, and he made it very clear that he would. The ­Opposition Leader’s response was a defining moment.

Those who don’t get it tried to say this was “divisive”, “a backward step in terms of reconciliation”. Some even said there was no public support for change. Clearly, these people just underscored my point about those who talk and those who listen because the reaction from my show, and the media that followed, highlighted just how strongly Dutton’s position resonated in the real world.

I would go so far as to say it could be our version of Donald Trump’s killer ad: “Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you”. Because when it comes to the flag, it’s always been clear where voters stand. And it’s not with a prime minister who’s clearly embarrassed about our flag and the history it represents.

In addition to his very first words after winning the election, that he would implement the Uluru Statement “in full”, Anthony Albanese has never had a formal media event in Australia without standing before all three flags.

As well, the PM, his ministers, and officials begin every formal proceeding with an Acknowledgement of Country (often repeated, one speaker after another) and where it is an event, there’s usually a taxpayer-funded Welcome to Country from a local elder that’s no longer a short set of words but invariably a lengthy speech with heavy political undertones.

Yet in an election campaign where he stressed “safe change”, Albanese hardly even mentioned the voice, let alone his intention to elevate the Indigenous flags to co-equal status with our national one. Nor have the Australian people ever been asked to vote on whether Indigenous flags should always be flown alongside the national flag; parliament has never considered it; and to the best of my knowledge, partyrooms have never debated it.

And if it ever were put to the public, my sense is they would overwhelmingly reject it. After all, what other country routinely flys three flags rather than just one; and in what other countries do aircraft routinely land to an announcement that the relevant airport belongs to a particular ancestral tribe? Yet flying the Aboriginal flag has crept in by stealth, as has the practice of routine acknowledgments of country.

At one level, this could be portrayed as mere courtesy: a bit like the PM’s presentation of his failed Indigenous voice as a gracious ­acknowledgment of the place of Aboriginal people in modern Australia. But just as the voice, properly considered, was profoundly subversive of our system of government, by giving some people an extra say based on how long their ancestors had been here, the presence of three flags every time our PM makes a formal announcement, and the ubiquitous welcomes and acknowledgments, are implicit concessions that modern Australia must make permanent atonement for the original sin of British settlement.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Richard Marles and Matt Keogh hold a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra. Picture: Martin Ollman

Maybe, prior to the voice referendum, most of us were prepared politely to acquiesce in this fiction that Aboriginal clans in 1788 were somehow sovereign “nations” like France or Spain. But after the resounding defeat of the voice, everyday Australians feel empowered in numbers to say we need to put all the guilt rituals behind us.

Inevitably, the eruption of modernity onto an ancient continent was initially devastating for the original inhabitants. And almost inevitably, there were episodes of violence, injustice and racism as two very different cultures tried to come to terms with each other – despite officialdom’s constant injunctions that Aboriginal people were entitled to the full protection of the law.

None of this has stopped modern Australia from being among the most colourblind and least racist of countries, with Aboriginal people fully accepted and respected as the first Australians. And analysis of our parliament shows the respect voters have for strong Indigenous voices (provided they do not abuse our institutions like Lidia Thorpe). It’s hard to recall a swifter and more emphatic public response, at least among those who watch Sky News or read News Corp papers, than that to Dutton’s declaration that, as far he was concerned, it would be the one and only Australian national flag front, centre, and foremost should he become PM.

After all, there is only one flag protected by its own special act of parliament, (The Flags Act 1953), and that’s our national flag; all others have merely “official” status. In reaffirming his long-held commitment to the Australian flag, Dutton didn’t deny the place of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island flags, as some have tried to suggest; he said they were important, along with the state flags and the armed forces flags; just that they were the flags of some of us, not the one flag for all of us.

My instinct is that this is the tip of an iceberg of millions of Australians, full of goodwill towards their Indigenous fellow citizens, yet nonetheless sick of the separatism implicit in flying distinct sub-­national flags and official acknowledgments implying that some are more entitled to be here than others.

Peter Dutton visits the Adass Israel Synagogue, meeting with members from the Jewish Community. Picture: Brendan Beckett

Showing that she’d learned little from the voice verdict, Uluru Dialogue co-chair Pat Anderson said: “It’s deeply disappointing and disturbing that some people have extended the ‘no’ to all things … This is yet another remark from a man who’s made a career of using First Nations matters to not only invoke hatred but as a deliberate and inflammatory political move in his quest for the top job.”

Others accused Dutton of “whitewashing” history.

Labor accused him of being “divisive”. But hang on: how can it be “divisive” to insist on the pre-eminence of the one flag that represents every Australian – and to revert to the practice of every previous prime minister, Labor no less than Liberal?

In announcing there would normally be only one Australian flag, front and centre, under his government, Dutton wasn’t just establishing a clear contrast with Labor but also differentiating the Dutton Coalition from the Morrison one. As prime minister, Scott Morrison dismissed what he called the “culture wars” on the basis that arguing over the flag and over Australia Day would not ­create a single job.

But cultural issues aren’t irrelevant just because people mostly vote on bread-and-butter ones. Creating jobs is not the be-all-and-end-all of effective government. National pride matters too and we’ll never keep it if our prime ministers are indifferent to our flag and our history.