The Voice: Maori Activists Set an Example

In an article recently published in the Courier Mail titled “Recognise Our First Australians”, the author, Joe Hildebrand, says Australia will not be complete as a nation until our First Australians are recognised in the Constitution by the Voice to Parliament, as urged by the Uluru Statement from the Heart. He says this has widespread support. He doesn’t, however, explain how recognition of the Voice in the Constitution will complete the nation.

The nation of Australia came into full existence on September 17, 1900, when the proclamation was made under clause 3 of the Constitution of Australia Act declaring Queen Victoria’s satisfaction that the people of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland, Tasmania and Western Australia had agreed that they should be united in a federal commonwealth under the name of the Commonwealth of Australia. Previously, the continent was divided among six British colonies.

Hildebrand’s claim is legally meaningless, though…