Indigenous voice to parliament: Don’t slam door on children, says Noel Pearson

Indigenous leader and leading Yes campaigner Noel Pearson has urged undecided referendum voters to consider the futures of young Indigenous children when they cast their ballot.

Yes campaigner Noel Pearson at Uluru this week. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Indigenous leader and leading Yes campaigner Noel Pearson has delivered his final pitch ahead of Saturday’s referendum, urging undecided people to consider the futures of young Indigenous children when they vote.

Speaking at a Yes campaign event in Perth’s Kings Park on Thursday, Mr Pearson – who has spent the past 15 years pursuing constitutional recognition for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people – said the vote represented an opportunity for all Australians to make a difference to future generations.

With polls across the country pointing to almost certain defeat for the referendum, Mr Pearson called for those still contemplating how to vote to put politics and the personalities of prominent campaigners from the Yes and No camps to one side and not “slam the door on the children”.

“This is not about Noel Pearson or Patrick Dodson, or Jacinta Price or Warren Mundine. We are the past. The children are the future. We’re doing this for them.”

“Our generations, we’re just setting this up for the children. We’re setting it up for a better future for them so that they can grow up in Australia with their white friends, their Asian friends, their African friends who are Australians along with them, and they are going to enjoy a better relationship than in the past.

“Don’t leave the children of the future with the door slammed in their face. This is their time. We’re doing this for them.”

Mr Pearson was critical of leading No campaigner and Coalition Indigenous Australians spokeswoman Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, describing her position on the voice as a “great tragedy”.

The referendum campaign has helped propel her from first-term backbench senator to one of the Coalition’s most prominent figures. Mr Pearson said Senator Price was concerned about many of the same issues the Yes campaign was concerned about, but neither she nor the No campaign had offered alternative solutions.

“To say no is not a solution. To vandalise a great idea like this that’s been long in the making within the community, to vandalise it at the 12th hour, has not been helpful,” he said. “Yes to the voice is the solution for the future. It’s a great pity that this has become politicised by the politicians.”

Mr Pearson said while he had known Senator Price for many years, she had become a vocal opponent of a voice to parliament only since her election last year. “I didn’t know where she stood when she was a normal citizen. I only understood she was for No after she became a politician. It’s the politicians and the political parties that have trashed the bipartisanship that existed for so long.”

Mr Pearson was joined by former athlete and ex-senator Nova Peris, ex-Coalition Indigenous Australians minister Ken Wyatt, Greens senator Dorinda Cox and WA Labor MP Divina D’Anna.

While the No campaign has attacked the voice as a mechanism for division, Ms Peris said Australia would remain divided as long as its Indigenous people were not recognised in the Constitution.

She said she feared what would happen on Sunday if Australia woke up to a No vote. “I’m asking all Australians to reciprocate the love, the love that people like myself and Cathy Freeman and Adam Goodes, all outstanding Australians, gave to you. Reciprocate the love, see us, put the firstborn on the birth certificate and allow us to have a voice,” she said.