To damn them with faint praise, it should be acknowledged that the embiggeners of apartheid in Australia are bothering to ask before they irrevocably divide the country along racial lines. They’re still not telling us the whole truth of what they’re up to, of course, but at least they’re bothering to go through the motions of democracy.
Unlike in New Zealand, where successive governments have more or less secretively foisted apartheid — oops, “co-governance” — without even bothering to ask Kiwis whether they want it or not.
Because, as is increasingly likely in Australia, when the people get a say, they reject racial separatism out of hand.
The Albanese Amendment is dead. Unlike the death of the Queen, it ought not be lamented. The Albanese Amendment consisted of three sentences to be inserted into our Constitution to establish and regulate an Indigenous voice to parliament.
While the Prime Minister has studiously refused to detail what legal advice he received before making his proposal, let alone release that advice, it has become clear that it is a gross overreach.
As proposed, it was not merely a voice to parliament but had to be consulted on any act or omission of executive government, no matter how trivial, that in any way related to Indigenous or Torres Strait Islander people.
It goes even further than that, of course. It would make Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people — or, more correctly, a handful of powerful, connected activists — virtual overlords of all Australians.
It was not limited to matters that only affected Indigenous Australians but also gave Indigenous Australians an extra say over matters that affected Australians generally. It effectively abrogated parliamentary supremacy by delegating to the High Court the final say over the powers, functions and processes of the voice and over the issue of who could vote for or be represented on the voice.
Few attempted power grabs in Australian history have been more ambitious or more brazen.
If that’s not audacious enough, the taxpayer-funded captains of Aboriginal Industry want more. A whole lot more.
The University of NSW’s Indigenous Law Centre [ILC] now has revealed the Albanese Amendment does not go far enough for them. Their three discussion papers, released this month, envisage a far more powerful voice, to be renamed the First Nations voice. They want a “proactive” body, not one that is “advisory or consultative only”.
The voice, not parliament or the courts, will determine what “matters it deems relevant” to make representations on. They want the option for further powers to be given to this body in future, including making representations to state and territory governments.
If all of this is not outlandish enough, the ILC also proposes that the legislation to implement the design of the voice be essentially that recommended by another Indigenous body, the Indigenous steering committee.
At least Albanese only has the chutzpah to ask that we vote first and wait for details later. These brazen power grifters are demanding to be given a blank cheque to arrogate to themselves whatever powers they decide they deserve.
As with the tiresome, childish antics of the likes of “Aboriginal” senator Lidia Thorpe, at least they’re doing the rest of us a backhanded favour.
Some on the Yes team now realise, belatedly, that the maximalist position, even in the form of the Albanese Amendment, has no hope of success. What on earth do they make of the ILC’s radical proposal? […]
The one thing is certain. While the Albanese Amendment is dead, attempts to revive something like it, even possibly more radical, will continue. As the Indigenous Law Centre has demonstrated with its latest salvo, radical activists never retire, they simply conduct new rounds of “consultation” in the hope they can slip something by us when we are not looking.
The Australian
If conservatives and centrists haven’t woken up by now, the lesson is clear: the left will never be satisfied. Too much power is never enough for these authoritarian creeps. The more we give in to them, the more they demand.
The only recourse is to treat them as you would any other, spoiled, demanding toddler: just say “No”. Firmly and decisively.
And ignore the howling and foot-stamping.
