Without a voice there is no unity, and no reconciliation
A plan to have local and regional Indigenous Voices underpinning the national body warrants more attention.
“The voice will never work because it will be run by the same big names who always have their say in Sydney and Canberra,” said another, to knowing nods of approval. “This has been tried so many times, from ATSIC to the national congress, and it won’t last this time either.”
What might surprise you about these sentiments is that they do not come from city-based conservatives but from regional Indigenous people. We often hear non-Indigenous people offer critiques like these, and many see this as a contest between Aboriginal aspiration and non-Indigenous resistance, but the debate around the voice is complex on all sides.
As one of the few non-Indigenous members of the government’s Senior Advisory Group on the voice co-design process, I spent two days this week at a series of consultations with Indigenous community members about how all this might work. We encountered scepticism, constructive advice, pertinent questions, weariness, and enthusiasm.
The reason I shared some of the harshest criticism first is to highlight how the politics of the issue are not black and white; they are unpredictable and tease out differences in Indigenous communities, as well as in the broader debate. (My reporting of what was said does not break confidences because summaries of the meetings are posted online.)
The overarching message from four sessions in Moree and Tamworth was that local people needed to be heard, and that grassroots people and issues require attention. If a voice can help achieve local action on the things that matter to them, Indigenous people will welcome it with open arms.
Plenty of useful ideas were shared, as well as frustration and trauma in the face of juvenile crime and suicide, or problems with healthcare and education. My advocacy of the voice project over the past seven years has been predicated on it being able to deliver practical benefits, and this attitude was palpable in our sessions — these Indigenous people do not want symbolism, they want practical outcomes.
Indigenous communities have heard it all before. They understand a long history of government processes, and a myriad government and non-government agencies, and they want to ensure that this time is different. One pithy contribution pointed out that it is not much good having a voice unless someone is listening.
Much of the political debate and, to be frank, most of my previous writing on this topic, has focused on the national voice to parliament. But the plan to have local and regional voices underpinning the national body warrants more attention.
It is one of those ideas that falls close to the thin line between genius and insanity. Imagine trying to conceive the regional boundaries, representational structures, and cultural considerations that can make this work.
The community consultations, being conducted right around the country, are central to bedding down the final design. Like any democratic exercise, perfection is impossible, but fairness and workability can be achieved.
The national voice is likely to be drawn from the local bodies, which means the regional voices can give authority to the national voice at the same time they keep it connected to grassroots concerns.
Indigenous Affairs Minister Ken Wyatt is committed to legislating a voice structure this term, even if many of his colleagues might silently hope that all his work runs into the sand.
Some of the ground is shifting. Former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce was one of those conservative opponents — along with Malcolm Turnbull and Tony Abbott, strangely enough — who described a constitutionally enshrined voice to parliament as a “third chamber”.
He subsequently recanted and apologised, recognising that this was a deceptive attack, and that it was constitutional conservatives who first embraced it. This week Joyce went further, telling me on Sky News that he would support a voice if it would improve outcomes for Indigenous people.
Nothing can guarantee that a voice will improve the lives of Indigenous Australians. But if it is well designed so that regional voices prioritise local problems and funnel them directly to local, state and federal governments, while also informing a national voice, then improvements should follow.
We have not done so well in Indigenous affairs and Closing the Gap over the years that we can afford to turn our backs on new approaches. These practical imperatives alone should drive us, as a nation, to see whether we can get a voice in place to try to deliver better outcomes.
But the “fair go” ethos looms large. If we propose to deny Indigenous people a direct input into the very decisions and processes that shape their lives, then we ought to stop misusing the term “reconciliation” — it is simply disingenuous to suggest you can reconcile with someone while denying them a voice.
And the structural and constitutional dimensions to this debate were revived this week by Noel Pearson. Like me, Pearson sits on the Senior Advisory Group, and like all of us he is aware of the government’s policy.
Scott Morrison and Ken Wyatt have said they will legislate a voice but not mandate it in the Constitution. Their terms of reference to the co-design committees make this abundantly clear — constitutional recognition is outside our remit.
But most of the appointees are already on the public record as supporting a constitutionally mandated voice as enunciated in the Uluru Statement from the Heart. So this issue was always going to be thrown up again, and Pearson has done just that.
This constitutional issue should not really be a serious sticking point. There is much political timidity at play, and a tendency to underestimate the public’s ability to comprehend these issues.
The federal parliament already can legislate the voice under its special “race” power — Section 51 (xxvi). It is not beyond the wit of our constitutional lawyers to draft an amendment that says such a voice must be provided, with the design and functions left, as they are now, to legislators.
This matters for three reasons. First, certainty; in the consultations this week, many Indigenous people were worried that any gains achieved through a voice could be taken away at the whim of governments — all the work and co-operation seemed worthless without guarantees. So constitutional recognition would encourage good faith, greater buy-in, and therefore a more practical voice.
Second, it would complete the Constitution by delivering Indigenous recognition. While their preferred constitutional amendments are more symbolic, the aspiration of recognition is something that leading conservatives such as John Howard and Abbott have advocated as a necessary step for the nation.
Finally, it provides something worthwhile and empowering. If we truly believe the apology, if we truly accept the need for reconciliation, then we are accepting that our forebears, our national project, did not pay enough heed to the rights of Indigenous Australians in the past, and did not allow their voice to be heard. How then could we expect to move on, or do better, without giving them that voice?
“As long as its Indigenous peoples remain unrecognised then Australia is an absurdity,” Pearson said this week. “A nation missing its most vital heart.”
Pearson supported the co-design process that he is part of, and challenged it, by saying that once a voice design is finalised, and a bill drafted, it should be set aside until a referendum to recognise Indigenous Australians and mandate a voice is put to voters.
It is a deft idea. The voice would be a known quantity, lessening the impact of constitutional fear campaigns.
Still, this intervention might further muddy the waters in the difficult process of delivering a legislated voice. In which case Pearson’s intervention is more like an ultimatum — give us a constitutionally mandated voice, or none at all.
Generations of Indigenous leaders have fought these battles and enjoined these debates. They have seen prime ministers, ministers and governments come and go. So, we should not expect the hope of the Uluru consensus to be easily surrendered.
We ought to match Indigenous determination with our own. As filmmaker Rachel Perkins said in her first Boyer Lecture in 2019; “If there is something that we at Uluru share with our fellow Australians, it is our love for our country, our land and our sea that binds us together and makes our futures inseparable.”
There is a beautiful simplicity in her observation. We are stuck with each other, loving this place, girt by the same sea. However difficult it is, however long it takes, we better make it work.
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The criticisms and scepticism about the proposed Indigenous voice were sharp and deep. “We shouldn’t say people are ‘Indigenous’, that term applies to anyone who was born here; we should use the term ‘Aboriginal’ because that refers to the original inhabitants,” said one man.