Across social media, under any news item or campaign post, one comment tends to appear over and over again: ‘vote no if you don’t know’. It’s become one of the primary slogans of the ‘No’ campaign, plugged by figures like Peter Dutton.
This is alarming. On October 14th, every citizen over 18 in the country is required to vote on whether or not an Indigenous Voice to Parliament should be recognised by the constitution. It is your responsibility, then, to get informed on what you’re voting about.
Unfortunately, disinformation has made it hard for voters to find accurate and reliable information on The Voice and make an informed choice. This holds true especially for new citizens who come with their own perceptions of our First Nations people. Still, if there was ever a time to get up to date on what you know, it’s now. No one eligible to vote has a choice not to be.
We’ve already created a list of resources on how to bust your own myths about Indigenous people – now we’re going to demystify and combat some of the disinformation we’ve seen around the Voice to Parliament.
Myth: the Voice will grant special privileges and rights to Indigenous people.
All Australians and Australian groups already have the right to make representations to parliament and consult on specific issues. For Indigenous people this will be recognised by the Constitution, so that it won’t be. This is to address systemic and structural disadvantage that has occurred since first contact by Europeans in 1776.
Myth: the Voice is divisive.
The Voice is only divisive because political actors want it to be so. To call the Voice divisive would mean that any legislation or legal precedent in the past that has worked to rectify the systemic and structural disadvantage that Indigenous people face is also divisive – this would include Mabo v Queensland, a court case that acknowledged that the Indigenous people of this country had their land and sovereignty stolen from them, and Bringing Them Home report, which encouraged an apology to all the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children forcibly removed from their families due to racist legislation.
Myth: there’s no detail on the Voice to Parliament.
The Uluru Statement from the Heart website has a series of downloadable reports that give a significant amount of detail on what the Voice to Parliament might look like. There’s also a handbook written by a member of the board of Australians for Indigenous Constitutional Recognition if you want something more digestible. It is ultimately up to the government to decide what the details of the Voice finally look like – the referendum is there to allow this to happen. The purpose of the constitution is to describe the structure of government, not go into the specifics of what it can and can’t do.
Myth: there’s no need for the Voice to be enshrined in the constitution, it can be legislated by the government.
The original Uluru Statement reports found that constitutional enshrinement was necessary in order to keep it immune from political actors and the actions of changing governments. It also helps ensure that the Voice will remain free of the influence of any one political party, and can therefore make decisions independently.
Myth: the Voice has the power to veto legislation or sue the government.
The Voice’s job will be to make recommendations to the government. The government can choose whether to follow the Voice’s advice or not. The Voice is also not a third branch of government – it is an advisory body.
It’s true that Indigenous people have a diverse set of views on the Voice to Parliament. While polls (conducted by YouGov and Ipsos) suggest that 80% of Indigenous people support the Voice, it’s hard to say how accurate this number is as it is hard to get a representative sample of Indigenous people for official polls. Some high profile Indigenous representatives have put forth their nuanced reasons for why they will vote ‘no’, and these are valid reasons that need to be heard. They do not do so because they do not wish to have a say in the way Australia is governed, but rather because they have other solutions which they would like to see implemented instead.
Unfortunately, bad faith actors have taken over the ‘No’ campaign, making it hard for the country to hear the complex debates happening within the community. Arguments like ‘vote no if you don’t know’ encourage apathy around the First Nations people of this land and the issues affect them. It is a benefit to these politicians and religious lobby groups that Indigenous people are not heard or consulted in any way.
We can’t let a referendum as important as this be guided by apathy. Get informed, and make sure the people around you are informed too.
More resources:
The Conversation: what you need to know before you vote in the referendum
