Indigenous leader Noel Pearson continues push for constitutional recognition and Voice to Parliament
Posted 4
updated 4
MarMarch 2021 at 10:04am
Noel Pearson says as long as the nation s Indigenous peoples remain unrecognised, Australia is an absurdity .
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Indigenous leader Noel Pearson says Australia is incomplete without constitutional recognition of First Nations people, as leaders renew calls for a referendum on a Voice to Parliament.
Key points:
Noel Pearson is urging the federal government to not give up on the push for an Indigenous Voice to Parliament
He criticised political leaders for delaying holding a referendum on constitutional recognition for First Nations people
The government earlier this year released a discussion paper exploring how an Indigenous Voice to government might work.
The Voice to government is not the same as the Voice to parliament that the Uluru Statement from the Heart proposed in 2017. This is because the government doesn’t support the Uluru idea of a distinctive Indigenous body enshrined in the constitution.
Instead, it prefers a body set up by an act of parliament. The government of the day could change its powers, or even abolish it, as it pleases. The powers could be expansive, but equally, they could be meaningless.
A Voice established under the constitution, meanwhile, would have the authority of the Australian people. This idea has attracted majority support in public opinion polls.