DEAR News Of The Area,

WITHOUT responding seriatim to the letter from the Hon Catherine King MP (‘We make better decisions when we listen’, 31/08), there are a couple of assertions by her that must be contested.

She claims a Voice to Parliament is about advice and that it would be a committee of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders from across the country who would give advice to the government of the day about what really works in their communities.

She adds to this with the assertion that putting the Voice in the Constitution gives it stability and independence now and into the future.

She concludes that a yes vote for constitutional recognition through a Voice gives us all a chance to be part of a better future.

It is clear that recognition and the Voice are two separate issues though there has been some blurring of that duality.
Whatever it may be it is not, as PM Albanese asserted in his campaign launch speech in Adelaide, simply a committee of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, local representatives from every state and territory, regions, remote communities providing advice about the challenges those people face in health, education, jobs and housing.

It will be a constitutional entity with its own chapter in the Constitution that ensures its perpetuity and a much wider ambit of power that is yet to be determined and probably will be over many years by the High Court as references are made to it concerning the extent of that power.

No one from either side of the Voice debate could sensibly deny that the Voice will be a constitutional entity that will grant one group of Australian citizens, and one group alone whether or not others are disadvantaged, a constitutionally guaranteed political entitlement.

That it would do so on the basis of ancestry makes it entirely unacceptable as being inimical to the principle of equal citizenship that underpins Australian democracy.

That will continue to be so in the face of continuing pressure from government, big business, academia, major sporting bodies and others in positions of power seeking to impose their will on ordinary Australians.

That pressure must be resisted in the absence of full and frank disclosure and explanation of the Voice detail, purpose, intended power and its likely manner of operation.

That is to say nothing about the other matters relating to treaty, truth-telling and financial settlement that have surfaced in the course of the debate thus far.

At present all Australins enjoy the same civic status regardless of race or background.

That situation should not be disturbed now or ever.

Any departure would change us as a people and cannot be contemplated in any circumstance.

Yours truly,
Ian DUNLOP,
Hawks Nest.