Greens accuse Labor of abandoning truth and treaty

The Greens have accused Labor of abandoning the truth and treaty process after the referendum defeat, but argue a Makarrata commission could help resolve the Australia Day debate.

Senator Dorinda Cox as more than a hundred gathered to protest Middle Arm ahead of the second day of public hearings about the proposed development in Darwin. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

The Greens say the date of Australia Day may not need to be changed if a federal truth and justice commission is established and improves awareness of the historic and ongoing injustices experienced by First Nations people.

The minor party has accused Labor of abandoning its commitment to a Makarrata Commission and the treaty process following the defeat of the voice referendum, arguing that a truth-telling body would help test whether Australia’s laws and institutions were still fit for purpose.

Greens First Nations spokeswoman Dorinda Cox told The Weekend Australian the Australia Day date could stay January 26 if a Makarrata Commission were to help the nation “find an understanding of the richness of history.

“To be inclusive on Australia Day – isn’t that a pathway forward for us? To build Australia, to become a nation, that we are a mature, diverse, rich culture that can live together in peace and harmony,” Senator Cox said. “What we need to do is find a process that allows us to get to that.”

In an interview as part of a series investigating the Greens’ policy platform, Senator Cox said: “What we haven’t been able to hear is the difficult truth that there were frontier wars in Australia, that there were massacres, that there were parts of invasion in our nation. And they’re difficult conversations for people to hear because it’s not within their own lived experience.”

A truth-telling process would be needed to successfully close the gap in Australia, with Senator Cox also optimistic that “in the next decade we will be looking at better Closing the Gap outcomes”.

Reparations or the payment of compensation for past injustices should not form part of a national truth-telling process, but could be “part of the next chapter” to be discussed “further down the line”.

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Senator Cox said a Makarrata Commission should investigate questions such as: “How did we get to this place now where we have laws that have been constructed?”, and “Are (today’s policies) the right structure, do they have the right fit, are they fit for purpose?”

“I think that the Labor government needs to be courageous,” she said. “I think that what they could do is support Makarrata or a truth and justice commission to lay the foundation of what could be their second term.”

The Greens have proposed a private senator’s bill to create a federal truth and justice commission that would conduct a “historical analysis of the impact of colonisation and an evaluation of the contemporary relationship between First Peoples and the commonwealth government and the impact of contemporary policies, practices, conduct and laws on First Peoples”.

Senator Cox said the Greens were flexible on the shape of the commission, but suggested it could have 10 commissioners from every jurisdiction across the country in addition to two co-chairs, one male and one female.

During consultation on the Greens’ bill, Senator Cox met with commissioners at the Yoorrook Justice Commission in Victoria, which last year proposed a transfer of “decision-making power, authority, control and resources to First Peoples” to give full effect to “self-determination in the Victorian child protection system”.

Rejecting Coalition Indigenous Australians spokeswoman Jacinta Nampijinpa Price’s argument that such an approach would represent a shift towards a new separatism in Australian society, Senator Cox said there was already an existing divide.

“You only have to understand and have worked in frontline services to understand the difference in relation to the response of the system to a First Nations person versus someone else in the mainstream,” she said.

“If we all believe that there isn’t a separateness that already exists in modern-day Australia, I’d love for people to provide some evidence of that.”