Voice dominates conservative conference featuring Tony Abbott, Jacinta Price

‘This generation of Aboriginal Australians are not victims. This generation of non-Aboriginal Australians are not oppressors,’ says Tony Abbott.

Former prime minister Tony Abbott speaks at CPAC 2023 Sydney. Picture: Noah Yim / The Australian

Former Liberal prime minister Tony Abbott and opposition Indigenous affairs spokesperson Jacinta Price have driven opposition to the proposed voice to parliament at Sydney’s Conservative Political Action Conference Australia on Saturday.

CPAC Australia is an annual gathering that follows a US model, which has in recent years been dominated by strongly conservative members of the US Republican Party, and it showed: the media passes read “FAKE NEWS” – a “tongue in cheek” joke, one organiser said.

Beyond well-established Australian conservatives such as Mr Abbott and Pauline Hanson, the conference also attracted newer figures including opposition Indigenous affairs spokesperson Jacinta Price and Victorian independent Liberal state MP Moira Deeming.

The near-full event at The Star in Sydney focused particularly on the upcoming voice to parliament referendum.

Mr Abbott, an outspoken opponent of the voice to parliament, called the coming constitutional referendum “the most important challenge” the nation faced.

“Between now and October the 14th, or whenever the referendum is held, this has to be our main focus,” he said in the event’s keynote address.

“I accept that our history, even the history of Australia, is far from perfect. Yes, if you go back far enough, there were injustices, there were massacres, but there was justice too for those who perpetrated them,’’ Mr Abbott said.

“But hundreds of Aboriginal men would not have signed up to fight for king and country in 1914 and 1915 if they had been the subjects of a racist empire.

“This generation of Aboriginal Australians are not victims. This generation of non-Aboriginal Australians are not oppressors.

“And the last thing that we should be doing right now is entrenching victimhood and institutionalising grievance in our governance arrangements.

“And that‘s why there can only be one response to this referendum proposal, and it is an absolutely resounding no,” Mr Abbott said.

Opposition Indigenous affairs spokesperson Jacinta Price, a leading No campaigner, said the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians was driven by urban-regional differences and a lack of “accountability”.

“The gap doesn‘t simply exist between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians,” Senator Price told CPAC. “The gap exists between those who live in the cities and those who live in remote and regional Australia.

“It exists between the people who can walk to the 24-hour chemist or the 24-hour emergency room and those who have to hold out for the next visit from the flying doctor.

“There is absolutely no shortage of goodwill in this country. There is no shortage of Australians who want to see the best outcomes for their fellow Indigenous Australians who are our most marginalised. But there is a shortage of accountability. There is a shortage of accountability on the part of those who claim to be doing the work.”

Senator Price also criticised “academics and activists from … the ‘Aboriginal industry’”.

Opposition Indigenous affairs spokesperson Jacinta Price at CPAC 2023 Sydney. Picture: Noah Yim / The Australian

“Well-meaning Australians are being lied to, told that the problems in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities are a product of systemic racism or colonisation and that the answer is to listen to academics and activists from the cities,’’ Senator Price said.

“Academics and activists from what I refer to as the Aboriginal industry, the people profiting off marginalisation,” the Country Liberal Party senator from the Northern Territory said.

Senator Price also criticised Anthony Albanese for his approach to the campaign.

“This is the Prime Minister‘s divisive referendum, and the Prime Minister has lost all credibility. He has no plan. He has no solutions.

“He doesn’t even know the detail, and he has surrounded himself with the likes of Thomas Mayo and Teela Reid,’’ she said, referring to two Indigenous activists.

“They don’t want the best for Indigenous Australians. They want the rent paid. They want to pay their respects to the Communist Party, the elders of the Communist Party. They want to abolish Australia Day. They want reparations. They want to tear down our system. They want to punish politicians who don’t listen to them. They want to divide us,” Senator Price said.