Day: April 5, 2023

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The Voice to Parliament

A voice to parliament in the new one country Australia?

Students

April 5, 2023

With the election of the Albanese government, the incoming Prime Minister committed to fully implementing the Uluru Statement from the Heart. Overarching the statement is ancient sovereignty and symbolic reunification from the Yolgnu word makarrata, understood to constitute the act of “coming together after a struggle”. The intent of the statement centers upon Australian constitutional recognition; at its heart is the re-centring of Indigenous sovereignty, and a subtext to achieve this. The implication within the statement somewhat challenges ongoing colonisation and occupation of our countries. With requests to explain the scope and role of an Indigenous voice for the Australian people, it appears at this early stage that the “voice” will serve in an “advisory” capacity only, without financial control or the authority to veto legislation. While the voice has been communicated as attaining majority community support, and emerges after extensive community consultation, Indigenous peoples in Australia are not a hegemony, and national consensus is yet to be achieved.

For over 230 years across the shifting fronts of armed resistance, protests, campaigns and diplomatic delegation, Land Rights and Treaty, have been rightly centred in the journey toward self-determination and Indigenous sovereignty. Proponents of the Uluru Statement’s centring, both white and black, may argue that Land Rights and Treaty are too radical a departure at this time for the liberal democracy at the heart of the new one-country Australia. From this vantage point, constitutional recognition and a voice may serve as a stepping stone, a real, concessional entitlement to a seat at the table of Australian administration. However, considering sovereignty and self-determination remain the primary aspiration for Indigenous communities, the shift towards the Uluru statement and a “soft reform of parliament” should be evaluated for deeper significance.

" ... sovereignty and self-determination remain the primary aspiration for Indigenous communities, the shift towards the Uluru statement and a “soft reform of parliament” should be evaluated for deeper significance."
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Positioned as the Uluru Statement from the Heart is—centred, within the sitting government’s Indigenous reform strategy—there is an apparent line of symmetry with critical race pioneer, the late Professor Derrick Bell’s theory of interest convergence. In the Australian context, on the surface, the rhetoric and optics of governmental benevolence have the appearance of good intent and justice; however, within dominant spaces of power, the advancement of Indigenous peoples has been recognised to usually coincide with parallel progression of non-Indigenous peoples. Importantly, as Goenpel scholar, Distinguished Professor Aileen Moreton-Robinson recognises, the threat of an organised Indigenous sovereign movement continuously presents as a danger to the logic of settler-colonial structures of government. In the absence of Land Rights, Treaty, reparations, and healing, all Australians should be cautious and thoroughly examine concessional offerings at this moment.

If the recentering of the Uluru Statement and its Voice to Parliament creates opportunity, what becomes the product, what is its strength, longevity, and purpose, and what role will education, schools, and teachers play? With school an integral tool in a racialised settler-colonial system of government, it is likely very little structural change will ensue. The fundamental restriction limiting meaningful progress toward makarrata is the school’s role in sustaining Australia as a settler-colonial state. In writing on Australian racism, Kamilaroi and Wonnarua scholar, Debbie Bargallie, outlines how the racial contract operates, leveraging systemic techniques of the law, policy, rhetoric, technology, and education, to wilfully exploit Indigenous peoples. Australia, by virtue of its enduring authority, inscribes the hierarchical boundaries of the racial contract through institutional discourse and space—such as the school system—and this orchestration is required for the maintenance of large-scale Indigenous oppression. Although Australian education is now concerned with the inclusion of Indigenous perspectives and Indigenous graduate capabilities for teachers, schooling, as a process of social engineering, remains tethered to historical practices intended to civilise, discipline, and assimilate Indigenous peoples. Australian schooling, therefore, is not without purpose.

As the movement toward an Indigenous voice to parliament builds from strategic Indigenous structural powerlessness, logical questions arise from the act of joining proposed by the Uluru Statement. In drawing upon Tanganekald, Meintangk Boandik scholar, Professor Irene Watson’s thoughts to critique the Uluru Statement and a voice to parliament, key questions must be asked to clear the road ahead. First, who are we now to join? Meaning, who are they and what are we now? What is it that is being joined, and what’s left and remains to join? What does it mean to join and who are they, the two joined now that they are joined? In what ways do they walk when joined and where can they walk—and are there any places left to roam? In visualising a makarrata, I see threads, spread among many threads and through this peace, the threads are woven to form yarn. But how we arrive at a place capable to weave remains unclear. Rigorous Indigenous representation in parliament should not be lost in the Voice as presently constructed. Consequently, further scope for discussion and strategic reflection garnered through education is necessary, to ensure the structures of Australian government are forced to fulfill the pressing needs of all Indigenous peoples.

*Troy wishes to acknowledge the input of Associate Professor Debbie Bargaille in writing this article.

Authors

Dr. Troy MestonDr Troy Meston (Gamilleroi) is a Senior Research Fellow within the Griffith Centre for Social and Cultural Research and an Associate Investigator within the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child (QUT). His research seeks to enhance educational outcomes for disenfranchised learners and communities through the use of technology.

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The Voice to Parliament

Explaining the Constitutional Reforms

April 5, 2023

In Australia there is a national legacy of dealing with First Nations in an oppressive manner, with numerous laws and policies enacted that entrenched their disempowerment. It is time for change. Constitutionally entrenched rights for First Nations are of vital importance. Australia’s First Nations should be listened to respectfully, and there should be a constitutionally entrenched mechanism that facilitates this approach, one that cannot be readily swept aside by whatever government of the day holds power.

In the 2017 Uluru Statement Australia’s First Nations called for ‘substantive constitutional change and structural reform’, stating: ‘We seek constitutional reforms to empower our people and take a rightful place in our own country. When we have power over our destiny our children will flourish. …We call for the establishment of a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution.’ This will require a referendum. While relatively few referendums have succeeded in the past, it is hoped by this author that Australia will vote ‘yes’ to enshrining a First Nations Voice to Parliament.

Australia’s Constitution is an archaic document that was established primarily to protect powerful interests upon Federation. Inequality has been enshrined in Australia’s Constitution for First Nations from the moment of its inception. Originally not even counted in the Federal census (under the since repealed section 127), First Nations have struggled with the consequences of colonialism implemented through law and policy measures that frequently purported to support their welfare whilst relentlessly undermining their rights to self-determination. A First Nations Voice to Parliament will have power to draw attention to these dynamics and call for change.

Declaration of Rights and Recommendations

Self-determination has always mattered to First Nations, and this is a core value enshrined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP – Articles 3 & 4). Australia has endorsed UNDRIP but has not implemented this Declaration within Australian law. The application of UNDRIP within Australia is currently a subject of Parliamentary Inquiry. UNDRIP sets out significant rights about Indigenous participation in decision-making, Article 18 states that:

‘Indigenous peoples have the right to participate in decision-making in matters which would affect their rights, through representatives chosen by themselves in accordance with their own procedures, as well as to maintain and develop their own indigenous decision-making institutions.’

Further rights about decision-making are set out in Article 19:

‘States shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them.’

Implementing these rights would go some way towards redressing Australia’s racist colonial legacy.

On 30 July 2022 Prime Minister Anthony Albanese released draft wording for the referendum proposal which recommended that these three sentences be included in the Constitution:

  1. There shall be a body, to be called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.
  2. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice may make representations to Parliament and the Executive Government on matters relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.
  3. The Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws with respect to the composition, functions, powers and procedures of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.
Words and substance

The Prime Minister stated that the precise wording of the proposal may alter closer to the referendum, but considered that the question put to the Australian people for a vote should be something simple such as: ‘Do you support an alteration to the Constitution that establishes an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice?’

Although the referendum proposal falls short of introducing into the Constitution Indigenous rights of ‘free, prior and informed consent’, the Voice proposal is an important step in promoting a representative body for First Nations that could lead to better law and policy outcomes. Such a step is long overdue.

The Australian Prime Minister has stated that ‘Enshrining a Voice in the Constitution gives the principles of respect and consultation, strength and status.’ While governments have occasionally engaged in processes described as ‘consultation’, when carried out with First Nations these have at times amounted to little more than information sessions about what the government is planning to do next. There has often been no opportunity for First Nations to shape law and policy outcomes or veto problematic proposals.

Enshrining rights to ‘Free, prior and informed consent’ would go a long way to addressing deficits in law and policy making that adversely impact First Nations. In researching laws and policies on social security programs that impact First Nations, those subjected to these programs often communicated that they did not get to have a say and were put on programs like the Cashless Debit Card without their consent. Were the Voice accorded sufficient power by Parliament it is possible that a repetition of these dynamics could be avoided in future.

Author

Dr. Shelley BielefeldDr Shelley Bielefeld is a Senior Lecturer in Griffith Law School. Dr Bielefeld’s interests include Inequality, Law and Society; Indigenous Social Justice Issues; Welfare Law and Policy; Regulation and Governance, and Poverty Surveillance. Dr Bielefeld’s research and research-based submissions have had an impact on policy debate, and been referred to in major reports by the Australian Law Reform Commission, the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs, the Standing Committee on Indigenous Affairs, and the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights.

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The Voice to Parliament

Historical referendums and constitutional change

Referendum

April 5, 2023

Generally, Australians’ knowledge of their own political institutions is too often found wanting. An Ipsos poll found in 2015, for example, that one third of Australians didn’t know Australia possessed a written constitution. Many more Australians don’t know the purpose of a national constitution, or how that cornerstone document can be changed.

Second, among those who do know, many are suspicious of governments as the drivers of constitutional amendment. This was the case in 1999 when a parliament-appointed head of state was seen as a “politicians’ republic”. That suspicion has only increased in a post-truth social media age where public trust in political institutions has been severely eroded.  

Third, constitutional change is logistically difficult in Australia given that a majority of voters in four of Australia’s six states, and a majority of Australian voters overall, must approve a question already passed by both houses of parliament (or by one house after three months’ delay). With just eight amendments approved from 44 attempts in 123 years, its clear constitutional change is exceedingly rare in Australia. 

The last successful referendum was 46 years ago when Australians very sensibly agreed that ACT and Northern Territory votes should be included in referendum tallies, that political parties (and not state premiers) have the final say as to who fills a casual Senate vacancy, and that High Court judges should retire at 70. But Australians in 1977 rejected a fourth question: to ensure House of Representatives and Senate elections are held simultaneously.

Worryingly for some, five questions since 1937 have won national majorities but still failed to be accepted by majorities in at least three states. In 1984, an attempt to make Senators’ terms flexible was rejected despite the support of 50.64 per cent of Australians overall.

Bipartisan support has been crucial for success

One conclusion is that Australians are a relatively conservative people who need strong reasons to embrace political change. The fact Australia has seen just eight national governments in more than 70 years offers some evidence of this. 

But referendums are more likely to fail when there is a lack of bipartisan political support. For example, Australia’s most enthusiastically endorsed amendment – the 1967 referendum to empower the Commonwealth parliament to legislate for First Nations people, approved by all six states and by over 90 per cent of voters overall – was supported by both the Holt Coalition Government and the Whitlam-led Labor Opposition.

Without bipartisan support – when one side of politics politicises the issue along party lines, often for base electoral opportunism – a referendum is usually doomed to fail, even when the question appears wholly innocuous. The 1988 “Fair Elections” referendum, initiated by the Hawke Labor Government, is a case in point. That referendum would have made it illegal for states such as Queensland and Western Australia to maintain their malapportioned “gerrymanders” that saw (conservative) rural electors’ votes valued more than those of (Labor) urban dwellers.

But, because the federal Coalition under John Howard argued Australia already had “fair” elections, the proposal was framed as a Labor trick – despite the Queensland Liberals urging a “yes” vote – that saw the referendum fail in all states, with a national “yes” vote of just 37.6 per cent.

Given the lack (so far) of bipartisan support for the Voice to Parliament referendum expected to be held later this year – the federal Nationals and the Northern Territory’s Country-Liberal Party have already urged a ‘No’ vote – the fate of the referendum rests with the federal Liberals. While leader Peter Dutton is yet to state his party’s position, Deputy Liberal Leader Sussan Ley’s description of the Voice to Parliament referendum as both a “political trap” and a Labor “vanity project” points to the Liberals also urging a ‘No’ vote.

Opposition to The Voice

Critically, opposition to the referendum appears to pivot on five claims. 

The first is that a Voice to Parliament is unnecessary given there are already 26 First Nations members elected to Australia’s nine parliaments. Representing 3.1 per cent of all MPs, Indigenous representation approximates the size of the Indigenous population.

Second, it’s been claimed other ethnicities have the right to establish similar bodies constitutionally empowered to advise the national parliament. This argument will find traction among Australia’s large Chinese, Greek and Italian populations.

Third, some worry the Voice to Parliament will become too powerful and, in becoming something of a third legislative chamber, could potentially veto legislation, even that beyond Indigenous affairs. This fear persists despite the reassurances of constitutional experts that such powers are impossible.

Fourth, and arguably the most convincing, is the view that Australian voters, while broadly supportive of any policy enhancing First Nation lives, simply have too little information on which to decide their vote. Once again, history shows that several referendum questions lacked detail of their later effects before the vote but were nonetheless passed. Indeed, Australians in 1967 did not know what path Commonwealth legislative power over Indigenous people would take, but 90.77 per cent of us nonetheless supported the amendment. 

Even so, reluctance to support a proposal because of a lack of detail cannot be dismissed as illogical, and it’s up to sectional interests on both sides to supply accurate information and to engage in public debate.

Last, opposition comes from those who worry that, should the Voice become unworkable or obsolete, then removal from the constitution – attained only by another referendum – becomes virtually impossible. 

It becomes clear that these fears – shared across sex, class, age and geography – are more than isolated anxieties: they underscore Australians’ small ‘c’ conservatism and their reluctance to embrace change. 

If the referendum does fail, it will be decades before the question is revisited constitutionally.

Author

Dr Paul WilliamsDr Paul Williams is an Associate Professor of politics and journalism at Griffith University’s School of Humanities, with a special research interest in Australian federal and state elections and voter behaviour. He is also a weekly columnist with The Courier Mail newspaper, and is published in various scholarly journals.

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The Voice to Parliament

Is The Voice to Parliament necessary?

Saltwater and Desert

April 5, 2023

Later this year Australians will be asked whether they support amending the Australian Constitution to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples through a Voice to Parliament. Others as part of this series have written about the technical aspects of the referendum including what the Voice is, how it will work, and why constitutional enshrinement of the Voice is key.  

I support the Voice and the Uluru Statement from the Heart for many reasons. These are informed by my expertise as a lawyer and researcher. I believe the Voice is our best chance yet to achieve real change in this country for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. I trust the process that has developed the Voice and the overwhelming weight of expert legal opinion from the nation’s leading constitutional scholars and practitioners that support the Voice amendment.  

I wanted to provide insight outside of my expert opinion as a constitutional lawyer. I am a Wamba Wamba First Nations person and have worked closely with the Uluru Dialogue on advocating for a Voice to Parliament for the past five years. My opinion is not neutral. I do not believe there are neutral opinions on an issue as important as the Voice to Parliament. 

" ... the Voice is our best chance yet to achieve real change in this country for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples."

I believe in the justice of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander claims. It is an undeniable fact that before others, we, as the Uluru Statement from the Heart states, “were the first sovereign Nations of the Australian continent and its adjacent islands”. Recognition of this fact necessarily means more than consigning our people to history as a mere footnote to the Australian Constitution through minimalist symbolic recognition.   

I understand the Australian Constitution to be more than the law that establishes our legal and political systems of governance. It is of course that; but is much more. So too the Voice. It is about our constitution more broadly – our cultural values, our institutions, our society. None of these exist in a vacuum detached from one another as though our legal institutions are entirely separate from culture and society.  

Yet the constitution of Australian society was developed through the denial and exclusion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, of my family. This is a recent history that continues to leave an indelible mark on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and communities, and on the Australian community more broadly. Especially due to the continued denial by some of the legitimate claims of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.  

Moving beyond symbolism

This lack of recognition and respect matters not just for the symbolism of who we are and our self-worth, but also for the relationships we have and our ability to make practical change to the issues we face. None of the decisions made throughout our history toward the Indigenous community are disconnected from the lack of recognition and respect that fundamentally informs our relationship. From the top down and back, the culture of power and decision making in this country has been one informed by the failure to recognise and respect the rightful place of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and the necessary structural changes that come with such recognition to engage with and respect Indigenous rights. 

The Voice is about recognition and representation to address this historic failure of that continues to inhibit our relationship. It is recognition of the undeniable and rightful place of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples while providing direct and permanent representation on matters relevant to us as Indigenous peoples. 

A significant gesture. Former Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam pours red soil into Vincent Lingiari’s hand on 16 August 1975, symbolised the legal transfer of Wave Hill station back to the Gurindji people.

I often become frustrated with the amount of misinformation that circulates about the Voice. Including claims about the potential neutrality of politics and law in the face of so much continued suffering in the Indigenous community. I won’t repeat them. They can be relentless and disheartening, especially as an expert in this field that knows otherwise.  

Yet these moments more broadly provide me with opportunity to reflect on another major focus of my research: the responsibility we all have as individuals that are part of something bigger than ourselves, to understand, respect and see justice done to others. I am not naive to the reality of that responsibility and just how often it is failed or devalued, or how others would paint it as naivety itself. Yet beyond the many disingenuous distractions that are pushed about the Voice, beyond the political and legal claims made despite expert opinion and evidence otherwise, it is this responsibility I return to as my guiding force.  

That responsibility is tangible, it has a face. It is my grandma born in 1930 who will turn 93 this year. To understand she was born under the protection acts where she was expected to die out as formal government policy, pushed to the edge, excluded from society. To understand her hardship and the change she has seen in her life, but to understand there is still more to be done. It is the names of my family entered in the ration books, their blood quantum (full-blood, half-cast, octoroon) listed along with their rations and behavioural records. The faces of those no longer with us, of those I never met and have only seen photos, of those that suffered in so many ways. The names like Arthur of my Great-Great Grandfather, now carried by my son.  

Family, culture, tradition

But it is also the faces of my family proudly practicing their culture and traditions. The smile on my cousin’s face when, after a surprise meeting, I got to be with him on his country for the first time. The unrestrained joy of my cousin’s kids dancing for NAIDOC Week and on January 26, ochre on their faces, emu feathers adorning their belts weaved by my aunty. The pride my cousin takes in knowing her language and working with Indigenous artists all over this country. It’s the responsibility I have to all those faces – known and unknown – to those that have come and gone and those yet to come that keeps me going and makes me truly believe in this reform and our responsibly to it.  

It is that responsibility too that I encourage all Australians to embrace. We have before us an opportunity we will likely never have again. That is what the invitation from the Uluru Statement from the Heart means to me. It was issued to all Australians in full knowledge of our history but in hope of a future we can create together. Don’t be shy or discouraged by the enormity of the task before us. Embrace being part of something bigger than you or me, embrace your opportunity to make a real difference and see justice done. 

Author

Eddie SynotEddie Synot is a Wamba Wamba First Nations person who writes about Indigenous experience at the intersections of law, culture and society, exploring how these different fields impact upon and affect different representations of Indigenous peoples. He is an Indigenous academic lawyer and researcher with the Griffith Law School and the Indigenous Law Centre UNSW.

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The Voice to Parliament

The Voice to Parliament: Australia’s Constitution

The Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900

April 5, 2023

Most people know, this referendum vote is not just about creating a new institution to represent and convey the aspirations of Australia’s first peoples within our Commonwealth democracy.  It is also, first and foremost, a way of formally recognising our first peoples in the Australian Constitution, the foundational law of our entire nation. 

Over the years, Griffith University’s Australian Constitutional Values Survey has shown that a very large majority of Australians want to see this done.  Constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians will fill a huge and chilling political silence in that crucial document.  It will also take us into a new phase of reconciliation between the political systems of our continent’s original owners and citizens, developed over thousands of years, and the one imported into the continent with British colonisation just 235 years ago. 

But there have always been two big challenges for Indigenous constitutional recognition.  The Voice proposal solves both. 

One has been how to provide a form of recognition which does not tread too far into the vexed question of how best to recognise Indigenous sovereignty, as a collective of first nations who never ceded their territory, relative to the ‘sovereignty’ of the Australian people as a nation under our post-colonial Constitution. 

"Constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians will fill a huge and chilling political silence in that crucial document"
Sir Samuel Walker Griffith
Sir Samuel Walker Griffith, co-author of Australia's Constitution
Strengths of this Referendum

The first strength of this referendum is that a vote for a constitutionally enshrined Voice will explicitly recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, in a way that should support but does not prevent any particular resolution of those difficult sovereignty questions, which on most analyses of contemporary politics, need more time to play out. 

As the Uluru Statement from the Heart lays out, enshrining a formal Voice to Parliament is just one of three key elements.  The Voice can then advise on the path to a federal Treaty, as a way of negotiating how Indigenous and Australian sovereignty should meet in the 21st century.  And obviously the Voice can also support and guide the Truth-telling needed to overcome generations of misunderstanding, miseducation and, often, denial about key aspects of our colonial history, necessary to achieve and sustain that full political reconciliation. 

The second strength of the Voice proposal is just as great, and even more immediate.  A permanent, highest-level, national Indigenous representative body offers huge potential for boosting practical improvements in the policy decisions of government which affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people every single day.  This was always the second challenge for constitutional recognition: how to make it more than simply a symbolic, or token gesture. 

Symbolic or historical recognition of the reality of prior Aboriginal ownership – such as attempted in 1999 – is important but it is not enough.  It’s clear that all Australians, and especially Indigenous citizens, also want a meaningful form of recognition which helps address the practical consequences of two centuries of colonialism, and the actual social, health, educational, economic and political needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people today. 

The Voice does this by offering a new platform for the type of engagement between governments and our first peoples that can deliver far better policy design and implementation, on a myriad of burning issues, than we have had for decades, if ever. 

It can inform legislation and policy in a way that no representative body or agency has done before.  It can cut through bureaucracy and offer solutions that will give influence and control back to Aboriginal and Islander people over decisions that affect them, in place of years of policies that are often mediocre at best, and failed or destructive at worst.  It can draw attention to what works, and make it standard in what the Commonwealth Parliament and Government do, across the board. 

And in keeping with the long-term scale of this task, and the rightful place of the first Australians in our Constitution, an enshrined Indigenous Voice to Parliament will be permanent.  Not something that comes or goes with future parliaments or governments. 

Lack of detail?

Much has been said about lack of detail, and uncertainty about whether these goals will be achieved.  But I feel like I know enough from the years of legwork that have already gone into this, and enough about the fact that Parliament itself will determine the final shape of this new institution, to have confidence in voting ‘yes’ for the change on the table. 

Put simply – it is by far the best option for constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians anyone has come up with.  When first floated by Noel Pearson and colleagues at the Cape York Institute, it seemed ambitious, but within months, our Constitutional Values Survey showed it to be the only option that actually met the above tests and was genuinely capable of winning support across non-Indigenous citizens as well as Indigenous Australia. 

Until then, the main plan was about recognising the first Australians by simultaneously removing or improving the Commonwealth’s power to make discriminatory laws based on race.  But this was confusing, and not something enough voters were ready to support, whether because some think such laws still have their place, or because they know such laws also provide a basis for positive, not just negative discrimination. 

Fundamentally, the Voice is a better plan.  Because as Noel Pearson himself made me realise years ago, this question is not actually about the fact that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are their own distinct races, in ethnographic terms.  It is about the fact that, irrespective of race, they were here first.  And owned this continent and its islands.  For thousands of years.  It is actually about simple political history, truth, identity, and justice.  It should also be about building pride and self-respect in ourselves, as a nation.  Pride in being home to the world’s longest-standing continuous political cultures.  And pride in their survival. 

I expect my casting of my ‘yes’ vote will be one of the single most important things that I ever get to do, in my lifetime.  I will be proud to do it.  And if enough fellow citizens do the same for this referendum to succeed, then as a nation, we should all feel even prouder. 

Author

Professor AJ BrownProfessor A J Brown is leader of the Centre for Governance & Public Policy’s public integrity and anti-corruption research program, and Professor of Public Policy and Law in the School of Government & International Relations. 

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The Voice to Parliament

The practical effect of an Indigenous Voice: The case of ‘Critical Minerals’

Critical minerals

April 5, 2023

Critics of the proposed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to Parliament have questioned whether it will contribute in any practical way to addressing the social and economic marginalisation of Australia’s First Peoples. This criticism is entirely misplaced, as illustrated by the issue of Australia’s policy in relation to development of Critical Minerals. 

Critical Minerals are essential for the technology that the world is relying on the achieve the transition to renewable energy and deal with climate change. They include cobalt, rare earths, tin, tungsten, nickel and copper, and are indispensable to the manufacture of solar panels, wind turbines, batteries and electric vehicles. Demand for these minerals is projected to rise by at least four times in the next two decades, which constitutes a phenomenal rate of growth. Lithium as a relatively ‘new’ mineral linked to battery production has attracted considerable attention because its production needs to increase by 40 by 2040. Copper constitutes an even more significant case because while growth in demand is relatively modest (275% by 2050), that growth is coming from a base which is already very large and because, with the exhaustion of high-grade orebodies, most output now comes from massive open cut mines whose environmental and social impacts can be profound.  

There is a great deal of overlap between the location of reserves of Critical Minerals and Indigenous lands. A December 2022 study by the University of Queensland’s Sustainable Minerals Institute based on analysis of 5097 current and possible future Critical Minerals mines, revealed that over half of them, and 85% of lithium projects, are on or near the lands of Indigenous or other land-connected peoples. Half of copper projects are on or near Indigenous lands. This picture is replicated in Australia, with many proposed projects located on Aboriginal land, particularly in the Northern Territory and Western Australia. 

Critical minerals 1
Valuable opportunities

Development of Australia’s Critical Minerals constitute an opportunity to generate valuable employment and business opportunities for Aboriginal people, and to generate community revenues that will help overcome the serious disadvantage First Peoples face in access to housing, health, education and other services. However Critical Minerals also constitute a serious threat to the land, waters and cultural heritage of First Peoples, if they are developed in the manner in which mining has historically been conducted in Australia and in which it occurs today. Current state and federal laws offer little protection against the damaging effects of mining, as illustrated by Rio Tinto’s destruction of the Juukan Gorge rock shelters in Western Australia in 2020, and the irreparable damage to Aboriginal lands and waters caused, for instance, by Glencore’s lead/zinc mine at McCarthur River in the Northern Territory. 

It is essential that the interests of First Peoples are strongly represented as Australia develops its Critical Mineral resources. This has not happened to date. The former Coalition Government’s Critical Minerals Strategy does not mention the word ‘Aboriginal’ or ‘Indigenous’. The current Federal Government has promised to make Indigenous people ‘genuine partners’ in the development of Critical Minerals. It has yet to finalise its Critical Minerals strategy and it remains to be seen whether this promise will be fulfilled, but the early signs are not encouraging. The Federal Government released selection criteria for grants to potential Critical Minerals producers under its $100 million Critical Minerals Development Program (CMDP) a week before the deadline for policy submissions to inform the development of the Critical Minerals Strategy. There is no indication that there was any input from Indigenous interests in development of the Guidelines, and their Assessment Criteria make no reference to First Peoples and contain no requirement for applicants to demonstrate an intention to make them ‘partners’ in order to obtain a grant. In the meantime, federal, state and territory ministers are pushing for the rapid approval of Critical Minerals projects, justifying their urgency, in the words of the Federal Minister for Resources Madeleine King: ‘The world will need our … critical minerals to decarbonise … Without the resources industry there is no net zero’. 

Critical Minerals 2.jpg
AAP/Mick Tsikas, Shutterstock, The Conversation
Helping to end dispossession and marginalisation

Australia’s First Peoples must have a Voice ‘to parliament and the executive government of the Commonwealth’ if the development of Critical Minerals is not to become one more chapter in their dispossession and marginalisation. They must have a voice when the Parliament is shaping cultural heritage and environmental protection legislation, so that their lands and cultural heritage sites are afforded effective protection. They must have a voice to press the Parliament to amend the Native Title Act, which established the parameters for negotiations between mining companies and native title holders and which currently favours industry interests. They must have a voice when Federal ministers make decisions about whether to approve Critical Minerals projects that are subject to Commonwealth environmental legislation or export controls. They must have a voice when government ministers and senior public servants develop criteria for allocating federal funds to potential Critical Minerals projects, insisting that companies which ignore Indigenous interests are excluded from receiving grants.  

Granting an Indigenous Voice does not guarantee that development of Critical Minerals will benefit Australia’s First Peoples. It does create the possibility that such an outcome can be achieved. Denying an Indigenous Voice makes it more likely that, as in the past, exploitation of minerals on Aboriginal land will enrich the rest of Australia and impoverish First Peoples materially and culturally. 

Author

Professor Ciaran O’FaircheallaighProfessor Ciaran O’Faircheallaigh is Professor of Politics and Public Policy at Griffith University, Brisbane. He has published numerous articles and books in the fields of public policy, policy evaluation and policy implementation, resource economics and resources policy, negotiation, impact assessment and indigenous studies. For over 30 years he has worked with indigenous organiSations in Australia and Canada on social impact assessments and on negotiation of agreements with resource development companies, and has acted as an adviser or negotiator for many of Australia’s leading Aboriginal organiSations, including the Cape York, Northern, Central, Yamatji and Kimberley Land Councils.

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