Dodson urges Dutton to decide if Opposition supporting voice referendum

Labor’s special envoy on reconciliation, Pat Dodson, has urged Peter Dutton to make a decision on whether the opposition will support a referendum to put an Indigenous voice in the constitution.

Senator Pat Dodson during the Voice Panel Discussion. Picture: Valeriu Campan

Labor’s special envoy on reconciliation, Pat Dodson, has urged Coalition leader Peter Dutton to make a decision on whether the opposition will support a referendum to put an Indigenous voice in the constitution.

“He can’t sit on the fence on this,” Senator Dodson said.

“The referendum bill is coming next year and his party is going to be involved in the debate … they need a position. At the moment they’re just procrastinating.

“This is nation building. He needs to decide if he’s going to stay in the dark ages or be part of the future.”

The Weekend Australian has confirmed the Albanese government has decided to fund neither the yes nor the no campaign for the voice referendum, widely expected to be held in the second half of 2023. Labor will on Thursday introduce a pre-runner to the referendum bill that removes a historic legal requirement that every Australian household receives a pamphlet containing a 2000 word essay in favour of the referendum question and a 2000 word essay against. On Friday, Senator Dodson told a panel discussion on the voice in Melbourne, “The government is not interested in supporting any racist campaigns, which will have an impact on the question of the pamphlet”.

Senator Dodson said the government reserved the right to run a “minimalist education campaign” about the proposal to amend the constitution to establish an Indigenous body advising parliament and government.

He said he was concerned that campaigning in the months before the referendum could cause hurt and division.

“It could get nasty and it could get terribly negative,” he said.

“You do worry about that so you want people to be informed and you want them to be free to make their own decisions and not to be badgered by negative racist views: views that are ill-informed, untrue and irresponsible.”

At a panel discussion hosted by law firm Arnold Bloch Leibler on Friday, Senator Dodson described the voice referendum as an opportunity for all Australians to remake the foundation of the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people “in a better way than we did in the past”.

Former High Court justice Kenneth Hayne and Teela Reed during the Voice Panel Discussion. Picture: Valeriu Campan

“This voice is as much about us as Australians as it is about giving recognition to First Nations people,” he said.

“I would hope that bipartisanship can be achieved across the chamber and in parliament because this is not about politicians.

“This is about us trying to rise above our normal combative spirits to do something good for the nation and to show that we do respect First Nations people in this country and we do want to see them recognised in the constitution.”

Liberal senator Andrew Bragg, who wants a parliamentary inquiry to settle questions about the voice, told the panel discussion on Friday that the reform was “very legitimately a liberal or conservative notion”.

“(That is) because I believe that if you are going to make special laws for people as we do for Indigenous people in Australia – as we do in a very high number in Canberra – that we should be giving people a say on how those special laws and how those policies are deployed,” Senator Bragg said.

“And I think to be doing otherwise is to be running a very illiberal system.”