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When it comers to the Voice and its ambitions, it all depends who is doing the talking.
Anthony Albanese’s version (National Press Club, Canberra, May 18, 2022):
Good manners tell you when something you do has an impact on someone else, talk to them. That’s all a Voice is. Ask them, and hear them, and listen to them.
Linda Burney’s version (National Press Club, Canberra, July 5, 2023):
The first question I want to address today is why is the Voice needed? And the simple answer is: because the gap isn’t closing fast enough … From day one, the Voice will have a full in-tray. I will ask the Voice to consider four main priority areas: health, education, jobs and housing.
Noel Pearson’s version: (Garma Key Forum, Northern Territory, August 4, 2018):
I want to make an argument about why it is so important to constitutionalise the Voice. The Uluru Statement from the Heart anticipated that, following a constitutional voice, there will be a process of treaty, a process of national, of regional and local agreement-making – Makarratta – and we seek a commission to be established in Australian law to supervise that process of agreement-making.
There are, there’s business that we need to do, and we need to conclude, and that we need to visit what we didn’t do in 1770, we didn’t do in 1788, and at every important milestone over this past 200-plus years we declined to treat with one another about the fundamental question of how ancient Australia survives within the new Australia. That is what we have to treat about.
We’ve got to come to terms with how ancient Australia survives within the new, and we didn’t do it in 1901, we didn’t do it in 1988, we didn’t do it in 2001. Will we be able to do it, or at least commence a process in 2020, the 250th anniversary of that troubling sea voyage up the east coast of Australia? That’s the question for us. It’s a question that will never go away. It’s a question that is most clearly brought to the fore of our minds at Garma every year, and we heard that this morning from Jarwa, and from Ghalarrwuy.
We have to treat with one another about some fundamental questions about the old sovereignty, and the new, and their future co-existence. The Uluru Statement from the Heart talked about that spiritual notion of indigenous sovereignty, the link to the soil via our ancestors, the link that ties us to Mother Nature and to our ancestral bones in the land to which we will all one day return thither to be reunited with our ancestors.
We need a constitutional Voice because the subject matter of discussion that we need to have is heavy business. This is not some kind of service delivery discussion about health, and education, and housing. This is about treating with each other in relation to the most profoundly foundational questions. We will need a constitutional Voice.
Pens of adamant will need to underpin our position of negotiation. That is why I have been steadfast and my colleagues have been so steadfast in arguing that the first step is constitutionalising our position, creating a bridge between the Rock in the centre and the centre of power in the homes of the Ngunnawal in Canberra.
We’ve got to create a bridge, and it’s got to be pinned down in the most fundamental law of the nation where power resides. Without it, we’ll get pushed around, Without it, the question will be deferred again. Without it, we’ll enter into some prosaic discussions about housing, and health, and what Stanner always called that one-eyed hobbyhorses of Australian policy law, everyone’s favourite discussion about how it is that we might lift the indigenes from their misery. Stanner told us in 1968 that was a forlorn discussion.
Until we got to the heart of the matter, all of these hobbyhorses, lined up with great fidelity and energy, will not resolve this issue. We’ve got to have a foundational negotiation, but before we can do that, we can’t just enter it willy-nilly, we need a constitutional Voice for the first nations, a position from which we can never be shifted, a position from which to negotiate with all of the moral and historical power that is ours by virtue of our possession of this land for more than sixty thousand millennia [sic].
So for those of us who’ve come late to this strategy, you need to wake up. Treaty door is the second door. The first door is constitutional enshrinement.
Nimby power politics ain’t new Noel, put everything on the table your’ve got, snakes, cod, land use controls, the lot. and lets talk them over, no mega phones needed
I think you are exaggerating Noel. 60 thousand millennia is 60 million years, and given that Homo sapiens has only been around for about 500 millennia, 60 thousand seems to be something of an overstatement.
Apart from that typo, this is the sentence that puts us off voting for the Voice:
“we need a constitutional Voice for the first nations, a position from which we can never be shifted, a position from which to negotiate with all of the moral and historical power that is ours by virtue of our possession of this land for more than sixty thousand millennia [sic]”
Apart from the exaggeration noted above, i.e. it should be 60 millennia, in a 1000 millennia, aboriginals will have been here just 6% longer than the 1788 arrivals. And yet this Voice, in theory, will still be in place. Even today, the vast majority of aboriginals are of mixed race, and in many of those mixed race aboriginals, the percentage of aboriginal in the mix is minimal. In 1000 millennia, that mixture will be indistinguishable from the rest of the population.
The Voice, IMO, is an insult to the 80% of those with aboriginal descent who have made their way beaufifully in Australia, and indeed, on the world stage, today. Doctors, lawyers, engineers, sports people, entertainers, teachers, nurses, police men and women, and so on. What Noel and his fellow activists need to focus on is the futility of pursuing a stoneage lifestyle devoid of any of the services and infrastructure that allow the 80% of aboriginals who have spurned such lifestyles to live comfortably, and to figure out a way to break the nexus that exists between primitive lifestyles and the massive associated problems. A Voice in Canberra won’t do the trick!
I can’t quite understand the provenance of this article; did Noel Pearson actually write it and submit it to Quadrant for publication? I find that hard to believe he would choose this publication to argue for the Voice.
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Regarding what he said at Garma about the business that didn’t get done in 1770 and 1788, he was of course referring to a treaty/makarrata; but, at those times and places, there was no one to treaty or parley with!
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Whether Aboriginal people were living here along side dinosaurs 60 million years ago, or 600 years or less, it is irrelevant, and does not give …”a position from which to negotiate with all of the moral and historical power that is ours by virtue of our possession of this land”… In what sense was the land their “possession”? Only a generation ago their mantra was: “We don’t own the Land, the Land owns us!”
“I can’t quite understand the provenance of this article”
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Seems clear to me that someone, likely Roger Franklin, has reproduced a speech/ paper presented 5 years ago at the 2018 Garma Key Forum by Pearson to contrast it with the more recent words of Anthony Albanese and Linda Burney.
Trouble is, there was no ‘we’ in either 1770 or 1788, just a bunch of warring tribes, who, if the US Indian experience is anything to go by would seek various alliances with the beige people and their guns.
I suggest Noel revisits the High Court over the Mabo resolution and include development rights bypassing State intransigence and corrupt regulations.
cbattle1 above quite rightly raises the question of how this paper got to be in Quadrant. It’s fundamentally important to know.
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People change their views over time and they’re entitled to. There’s no clear evidence of when this paper was written for example. So in the absence of evidence to the contrary it would be reasonable to assume it was written recently and submitted to Quadrant by its author.
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It needs to cleared up because the context of how it got into Quadrant is extremely important regardless of timing. It would be quite a hugely different context if Noel Pearson had submitted this to Quadrant than if it’s simply a reproduction of a paper presented at some time.
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I certainly would not want to comment until I know that.
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So I’m respectfully asking the editor to clear it up because there is is an honesty about Quadrant that isn’t present in the mainstream media. And I want to make it clear I’m not suggesting this was done in a dishonest way. I certainly don’t believe it was. I just think it’s important to clear up how it got to be here.
As I meant to write initially (below) but hit Post Comment before I had deleted the last 4 paragraphs (no Edit feature is a bummer).
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Quote: “There’s no clear evidence of when this paper was written for example. So in the absence of evidence to the contrary it would be reasonable to assume it was written recently and submitted to Quadrant by its author”.
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It was spoken at the 2018 Garma Key Forum as indicated in the article. If that’s not enough evidence, there is the embedded link to the 2018 conference and if you click on that, from about the 20 minute mark you can hear Pearson say many of the exact words in this article.
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If that would take too much time, then the article, which you presumably have read fully before commenting, includes “Will we be able to do it, or at least commence a process in 2020”, which rationally indisputably indicates it was written/said well BEFORE the end of 2020 (and likely earlier), making how you arrived at “it would be reasonable to assume it was written recently” incomprehensible to me.
lbloveday, thank you for your help in explaining the situation.
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Of course you’re obviously right that Noel Pearson wrote the part ascribed to him in 2018 under the blue heading in which he also referred to 2020 as the future.
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So we know he held those views then.
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If he wrote this whole paper as the heading clearly indicates he’d also hold these views now (Sept 25 2023 the date of the whole paper which also includes quotes from Anthony Albanese and Linda Burney. I was obviously wrong on the date – it was clearly written on Sept 25).
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If he wrote the whole paper including the other quotes as the heading clearly indicates he’s also quoting Anthony Albanese and Linda Burney to distinguish his views from his theirs. Because if he wrote this whole paper he also wrote “When it comers to the Voice and its ambitions, it all depends who is doing the talking.”
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On the other hand if he didn’t write this whole paper even though the heading clearly indicates he did we can’t assume he necessarily holds the views attributed to him in 2018 now. That’s more than five years ago. Many people legitimately change their opinions in over five years.
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So that’s why it’s important to clear up how this article happened to appear in Quadrant and not just leave it to the speculation of posters here.
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It may have been written by someone else as you suggest and it was simply a mistake by the editor to put Noel Pearson’s name in the main heading as the writer of the whole paper not just the part attributed to him under the blue heading.
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On the other hand if Noel Pearson did actually write the whole paper it makes a huge difference to the meaning of this paper as I implied. It would mean Noel Pearson would actually be distinguishing his position from two very prominent supporters of the Voice.
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He’s spoken out quite frankly and directly in the past on issues like welfare distinguishing himself from other advocates. So to me it was plausible he wrote the whole article. That’s what I had thought until you and others suggested otherwise.
Hey Noel, You can argue all you like mate but it is still a huge emphatic No
The thrust of the article is not about reconciliation as most people know it. It is about separation. The Broederbond would be proud.
Warren Mundine is to deliver an address to the National Press Club today (Tuesday 26/9).
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Highlights will include:
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“When will Qantas paint one of its planes with a call to confront the violence and abuse of Aboriginal women and children in remote Australia?”
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“Do we want our traditional nations, or mobs, made into one homogenised group?
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“Do we want to be segregated as a race of people in the Constitution?
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“Do we want to cede the fundamental principle of our cultures that no one speaks for another person’s country?
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“That’s what this Referendum and the Uluru Statement is all about – a glossy marketing brochure for the misappropriation of culture, a misrepresentation of history, and for a radical and divisive vision of Australia.
Here’s what Megan Davis had to say about Mundine’s speech:
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“baseline Trumpian misinformation”.
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How pathetic is this woman, dragging Trump into it? Still if Abanese can drag Shaquille O’Neal into it, why not?
The problem with the whole ‘reconciliation’ agenda is that it posits two polities – Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians – who need to be ‘reconciled’ by something in the Constitution, or by treaties or the like, instead of a single, unified polity in which we are all Australians. It’s the opposite of what was achieved in 1967. Then, it was we’re all Australians; now it’s Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians in need of being ‘reconciled’. I reject that and sing I am, you are, we are Australian!
“I am, you are, we are Australian!” Beautiful, thanks Michael. That is my position.
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We are all on the good ship Australia. We do not want division in the crew that might put us on the rocks of racism.
“We’ve got to come to terms with how ancient Australia survives within the new,…” and further “We have to treat with one another about some fundamental questions about the old sovereignty, and the new, and their future co-existence”.
Claiming stone age sovereignty over the land from behind the relative security and comforts of two hundred years of the influence of western civilisation is fatuous. It is not coming ‘to terms’ at all and never will. The fact is, It’s regularly been an us and them stand-off, either between neighbouring tribes or between tribes and Europeans. Attempting to use the upcomming referendum to progress further elitist sovereignty aims should be titled: The Uluru Stake Through The Heart. That’s because it is going to be a regressive step and a costly waste of Australian’s tax payer revenue with the result of driving a stake through the heart of the racial equality and egalitarianism we’ve amply achieved in our country.
I take quite a different view on the Voice from those generally held on both sides publicly at least. Though there could be a number of people who share my views who don’t express them publicly I think. It’s a pretty cynical Aussie view based on the history of measures like this.
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I’m not sure exactly what Noel Pearson’s views are now because I’m not sure whether he actually wrote this whole paper or only the views ascribed to him over five years ago. And five years is a long time. However my views differ from the publicly stated views on both sides of this debate so they’re likely to be out of line with his like they are with most publicly put views on both sides that I’ve seen.
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I’ve only seen him on YouTube recently and it was such a general short talk and hard to distinguish his view from other advocates like Anthony Albanese and Linda Burney.
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I think there’s a heavy dose of disingenuousness being put by politicians on both sides of this debate. An exception to that for me was Jacinta Nampijinpa Price’s address to the National Press Club. There was nothing confected about that. She’s an extremely competent and impressive woman who ran rings around the left media questioners trying to trip her up. They were well and truly put in their place.
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However in my opinion the sky is unlikely to fall in with a YES vote or a NO vote being successful. Arguably there will be little change either way.
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It will close no gap nor undermine our constitution anymore than the existing grab bag of arrangements we already have. And if the constitutional issue turned out to be an earth shattering problem it would readily be fixed by another referendum especially if the constitutional Voice was being exploited by First Australians. Why? Because they only represent under 4% of Australians.
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It was a big mistake in my opinion by Anthony Albanese not putting the Voice and recognition as two separate questions. He’d know that by now I’m sure with polls clearly showing the Voice package highly likely to be rejected. I’m of course speaking with hindsight too.
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Anthony Albanese and other advocates have made the Voice to parliament such a crucial issue now for most First Australians. Far more crucial than it actually is. He’s tried to be a small target on the issue but nevertheless has raised expectations far too high for what a YES vote is likely to deliver.
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But perhaps more importantly : what a No vote is likely to mean. By implication he’s created an environment in which a NO vote will be very damaging for most First Australians.
And I should point out Anthony Albanese hasn’t created that environment intentionally and there are a lot of other people on the YES side also responsible for creating that environment.
I don’t believe a no vote will be very damaging to first Australians. 30% of people identifying as aboriginal aren’t aboriginal even using an absurd definition where you may be 3% Aboriginal descent. Many of the other 70% don’t want the Voice. Life will go on – Albanese may even legislate it as he should have done a year ago if it is so good.
It would appear that most Aboriginals don’t care, don’t understand it or don’t even know about the voice – just want to get on living life in Australia. The Voice has always has been the creation of activists like Langton, Pearson Mayo, and others – shoved down the throats of aboriginals in the various dialogues, which was a select group of aboriginals designed to garner support for a radical agenda to attack the vey foundation of Australia.
RobyH thank you for your reply to my comments.
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Whether, as you say, only a select group of aborigines were behind The Voice or whether a lot of people claiming to be aboriginal aren’t actually aboriginal does not in my opinion alter what I said.
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While I believe recognition of our First Australians in the Constitution would be a very good thing – expectations of what the Voice component of the package will deliver have been raised far too high based on the generally very poor results of previous initiatives in improving the lives of those who really need help. I can’t see how there’s anything in the Voice that will do any better than past initiatives. If anything it seems even less practical.
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But worse than that a vote for YES has been depicted very widely by YES advocates as a way of showing that Australians generally care about our aboriginal population. The unavoidable implication is they don’t care if they vote NO. And in what has been said by some YES advocates that has been far more than an implication.
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A No vote I believe therefore will be very damaging to our First Australians. In my opinion it will be damaging because many will feel the wider Australian population don’t care about them. I think it’s a serious, unfortunate and unintended consequence of how the whole debate has been framed and depicted.
“many will feel the wider Australian population don’t care about them. I think it’s a serious, unfortunate and unintended consequence of how the whole debate has been framed and depicted.”
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If that be the case because of the agenda being pushed by elite activists, using their emotional arguments, the blame is upon those activists. To the contrary however, it is my hope that even though some may, in the short term, be emotionally hurt, all those who identify as Aboriginal will instead eventually see a NO result as meaning that the majority want them to be included equally as members of the Australian national family. Just how those activists perform after a NO result will largely influence how much damage is incurred to both Aboriginals and non-Aboriginal Australians alike.
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“Hard cases make bad law” and an emotional reason, in my opinion, is not justification to include a racist provision in our Constitution which privileges or even recognises one class above others of our Australian family. The Constitution is a law governing how our democracy is managed and albeit that many good-hearted people see otherwise, I believe it should not be used as a history lesson.
Brian Boru thanks for your reply.
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As I explained it’s my opinion that the Voice component of the package will make very little difference in a positive or negative way over what has already been tried. In any case the polls show it’s highly likely the referendum will be clearly defeated.
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In fact if in the unlikely event the YES vote got up and there was an attempt to implement the voice element of the package the result may be less effective in helping those who really need help than many previous measures (which overall haven’t helped all that much) because to me it seems less practical.
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On the question of a NO vote being damaging to First Australians I agree with you that the more extreme elements on the YES side will be significantly accountable for that damage – especially any who have explicitly said a NO vote would be a sign Australians don’t care about our First Australians.
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But that won’t help First Australians who are damaged by the implication created around a NO outcome – intentionally by some and unintentionally by others – that Australians in general don’t care about our First Australians.
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I can’t see any harm in recognising who were Australia’s first inhabitants for over 50,000 years before the English arrived. It’s not a history lesson it’s simply formal recognition. And of course there’s an element of race in that but in my opinion not in an offensive way. Distinguishing races is not inherently wrong as some claim, for example when it’s done for some other reason rather than to deliberately offend.
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I believe a constitution can legitimately recognise our First Australians along with aspirations for the future and for our democracy. I think that’s a good thing whether it’s emotional or not.
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In fact I think a majority of Australians would support that recognition in the Constitution including those who oppose the voice element of the package strongly. Peter Dutton, for example, supports formal recognition in the Constitution. It’s a pity the question of recognition wasn’t put separately from the voice component of the package.
Bolt has a question for Pearson:
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https://todayspaper.dailytelegraph.com.au/infinity/article_popover_share.aspx?guid=6f52808d-5203-45e7-ac24-c164864154f5
Noel,
I’m voting NO and so should you.
I’m voting NO so that all Australians can get the opportunity to be educated like you.
I’m voting NO to continue to appreciate the diversity of my countrymen with respect, under ONE flag.
I’m voting NO to be released from the shackles of stone age tribalism.
I’m voting NO to provide for progress with equity, fairness, honour and merit.
I’m voting NO and so should you.