🇦🇺 Australian Indigenous Voice to Parliament Referendum (October 14th)

[AustralianSwingVoter]

In Adelaide the Prime Minister has officially announced the date of the Indigenous Voice referendum. It is to be held in only 45 days time, as widely expected.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Albanese campaigning in the state of Tasmania.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-31/albanese-spends-first-campaign-day-in-hobart/102797868
A state with essentially an aboriginal population of zero, Albanese is confident Tasmania will vote YES.

It will be interesting to see if Albanese visits the Aboriginal villages in outback Northern Territory, the most populated Aboriginal region in Australia who are disqualified from the 2nd half of the referendum because NT has no vote under the constitution.

If Northern Territory was a state, then the YES vote would be a chance in this referendum.

Not entirely true, there are few Aboriginal Tasmanians by partial descent. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aboriginal_Tasmanians

Truganini was considered the last born Tasmanian Aboriginal. Aboriginal people were shipped in by Batman from Sydney before and after. Batman used Mainland Aboriginals to kill the remaining Tasmanian Aboriginals.

Hence, the Tasmanian historians are currently campaigning to have 'Batmans" name removed from landmarks. Although he did not initiate the killings, he is now viewed like King Leopold in Tasmanian history.

From the very link you posted.

"Two individuals, Truganini (1812–1876) and Fanny Cochrane Smith (1834–1905), are separately considered to have been the last people solely of Tasmanian descent."

When we lived in Tasmania, were we taught Truganini was the last of her kind.

When I was young, there was a family named Mansell in the community who also claim to be part aboriginal.

I thought "Batman" was a nickname. Looked it up. Nope!

They even named an electorate after him!

[AustralianSwingVoter]

It's becoming difficult to find people who like the concept of the Voice to Parliament.

So difficult! Other than the entire Labor party, most crossbenchers, 80-90% of Aboriginals, and ~45% of the general public who even likes the Voice?

[AustralianSwingVoter]

(I happen to think closing Uluru/Ayers Rock is unjustified, but Australians at least passively seem to accept it being a no-go place).

I truly want to avoid this stupid argument however I can’t help but ask what on earth do you find unjustified about native title landowners enforcing their own rules on private property?

[AustralianSwingVoter]

In other news, Warren Mundine continues to prove to the world that he has zero principles other than self advancement:

"Warren Mundine would ‘consider seeking’ spot on Voice"

I'm not sure how this follows. Is your belief that the Indigenous Voice to Parliament should only represent those indigenous people who voted for it?

I imagine GoTfan is merely entertained at Warren Mundine’s continued hilarious spinelessness. The man was a Labor acolyte from the 90s, even rising to federal Chairman in ‘06! (as consolation for losing Preselection in ‘04). He then threw a hissy fit in ‘12 after Bob Carr was appointed to Arbib’s senate seat which he thought he was entitled to. Tony Abbott then gave him a plumb 6 figure job on an advisory committee and he suddenly became a devoted Liberal! And after 6 years of toadying to whoever won the leadership spill ScoMo awarded his loyalty with selection for a House seat on the south coast he’d never once lived in or had any connection to. The mess ended up splitting the Coalition vote between 3 candidates, which shockingly made it the only seat Liberals properly lost to Labor in 2019.

Warren Mundine is continuing his habits. He supported the Voice at Uluṟu in 2019, pushed for Turnbull to call a referendum on it, and only now has suddenly decided it’s the worst thing ever and must be voted down. Oh but if the voice passes he’ll gladly serve on a body he strongly opposed to be created!

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Terra Nullius was overturned by Mabo thirty years ago.

Was that a cause of the cultural shift, or an effect of it? My impression is that (as evidenced by the History Wars) the shift was already substantially underway by then.

The cultural shift that it was produced by (and which it then intensified) was the idea that Aboriginals should be treated as full human beings and that it was wrong that they were not for so long.

A shift for which Keating was an utterly perfect personality to shepherd through.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

The WA heritage law helped turn WA very hard No early in the campaign, but it never became national news. WA is just so far away their local political stories rarely break the national consciousness.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

So, a serious question. How is the issue playing amongst non-Aboriginal minorities? Because they're a pretty sizeable share of the population in some states now, and the history doesn't mean as much to them.

Polls show they support it, and I think the younger nature of immigrant vote will mean they lean more in favour. But considering the referendum is failing 65-35, they probably still vote against in but by less, than white Australians.

From personal experience, there are people who support 'yes' and people who are completely apathetic/think it's useless in a COL crisis and those people would probably not vote/don't want to vote, but because the referendum is mandatory, they'll probably turn up to vote no.

Personally I’m a touch sceptical of any polling crosstabs, but especially those for immigrants where they’re very new and haven’t settled down like age crosstabs have. But ultimately we’ll know how immigrant communities actually vote from Western Sydney/the usual Outer Melbourne electorates.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

'Fair call' for Albo to say First Nations men more likely to go to prison than university

It doesn't look like this referendum will change anything and mean these problems are taken more seriously, but obviously there is a real issue here.

Very funny that this statistic is used as evidence of oppression (unless the claim is that Australian police are going around arresting, and the courts convicting, large numbers of innocent people).

It was discovered in 2023 that Western Australian Police Dogs were 12 times more likely to bite an Aboriginal teenager between midnight and 6am than a white teenager.

The conclusion, "Police Dogs Were Racist".

https://www.watoday.com.au/national/western-australia/unleashing-police-dogs-onto-children-is-racist-ccc-boss-tells-wa-committee-20230315-p5csbn.html

We have to screen our German Shepherds now for Nazi party membership.

“not racist in intent, but are [nonetheless] racist“
To be clear here:
This isn’t from some woke lefty NGO, it’s the extremely well respected Chair of the Corruption and Crime Commission. Former DPP and state Supreme Court Justice.
The actual point of his report is police dog handlers may hold racial biases, the current use of police dogs is disproportionately against aboriginal suspects, and why the fck are police siccing dogs on children.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Think about it. You are looking for an offender in the bushes behind some houses. Police do not evaluate the 'age' or 'race' of offenders before they let the dogs go.

The entire point of the CC’s report is police are using dogs too much in situations where they are unnecessary or counterproductive. This problem is specific to the WA police force.

The reports main recommendation wasn’t to stop dogs being racist, it was that the WA police needs to establish clearer and tighter policies and procedures for their use. Because let’s be crystal clear here, police dogs should basically never be deployed on juveniles unless they are known to be armed or dangerous. That is the position of best practice, the WA government and WA police and the CCC investigation was triggered by concerns current policies failed to sufficiently heed this.

Think about it. You are looking for an offender in the dark in bushes behind some houses which are reporting a burglar. Police do not evaluate the 'age' or 'race' of offenders before they let the dogs go.

Factors that shape what is considered ‘reasonable force’ includes considerations of a suspect’s age, gender, size, fitness, and skill level compared to that of the officers present. Per the CCC and WA Police, the use of canines is considered a level of force between tasers and firearms.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Extending upon the previous point, I think mandatory voting doomed this to fail because everyone who is apathetic on the referendum who would otherwise not vote, is voting no.

Huh, so even referendums have mandatory voting in Australia? Are there any optional elections? Like, are local elections or stuff like city council elections (if they exist) compulsory?

Voting in local city council/rural shire elections is compulsory in NSW, Queensland, Victoria and Tasmania. It is still optional in South Australia and Western Australia. Turnout in compulsory council elections is usually 80-85%, while it’s about 90% in state and federal elections.

The voting system differs a lot but most of our local councils are also elected with compulsory preferencing single transferring vote, at most extreme electing 15 councillors in a district! So counting takes a while

[AustralianSwingVoter]

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Hell, Howard doesn’t even have the greatest Prime Ministerial eyebrows!

[AustralianSwingVoter]

I note that the basic geography of the referendum on The Voice is much the same as that on the Monarchy in 1999.

As was postulated by Antony Green prior to the referendum. It's a very clear "social/cultural axis" divide, if you can forgive the political compass reference. In Brisbane, Sydney, Adelaide and Hobart it very starkly aligns with income, much as culture in those cities does. Meanwhile in Melbourne and Perth it's far less income stratified (with Melbourne having far more woke working class, and Perth far more legit rich bogans, than the other cities). But more than anything else it correlates very strongly with the combined Greens/Teal vote, which is expected yet interesting.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

If anyone's interested, based on mobile teams and remote booths across the Outback, it looks like Aboriginals voted about ~70% Yes.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Are there exit polls (or just polls) with demographic breakdown of the vote in Australian elections? Would be really interesting to see how some demos voted.

We have (reputable) exit polling, however in a few months there'll usually be some psephological papers with detailed regression demographic analyses.

Oh and another question. Are there also "reserves" in Australia for aboriginal people like there are in Canada and America?

Not anymore. Instead there is Native Title which is... complicated but basically any land that's never been used by the white man can revert to original aboriginal ownership through the courts.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

100.00% of polling stations reporting:

60.25% No, 7,833,783 votes
39.75% Yes, 5,167,425

  1.07% Blank/Invalid, 140,145

74.34% Turnout, 13,141,403

(I assume that there may be a few thousands postal votes yet to count.)

No, more like about 1.5-2 million votes still to count. Postals will continue to be received and counted for the next fortnight, and absents and provisionals won’t begin counting till the end of the week.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

I note that the basic geography of the referendum on The Voice is much the same as that on the Monarchy in 1999.

As was postulated by Antony Green prior to the referendum. It's a very clear "social/cultural axis" divide, if you can forgive the political compass reference. In Brisbane, Sydney, Adelaide and Hobart it very starkly aligns with income, much as culture in those cities does. Meanwhile in Melbourne and Perth it's far less income stratified (with Melbourne having far more woke working class, and Perth far more legit rich bogans, than the other cities). But more than anything else it correlates very strongly with the combined Greens/Teal vote, which is expected yet interesting.

https://www.datawrapper.de/_/voYPu/

https://twitter.com/MarkusMannheim/status/1713168221296304557

[AustralianSwingVoter]

I am intrigued that Newcastle was a yes, whereas, say, Adelaide was a narrow no.

Newcastle remains the most working class substantial city in Australia, but it has a longstanding small 'l' liberal culture because of its university and its position as a major regional centre for public services: note that it voted for a Republic in 1999. Class patterns in these results were incidental rather than a primary driver, this even being true in places where they were very marked.

Meanwhile on the pre-2019 boundaries Adelaide and Boothby would both vote Yes, far more in line with what you'd expect and the Republic referendum. Now SA is down to 10 electorates the boundaries have bloated across traditional divides.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

It's funny how much many of the seats in Queensland (and to a lesser extent in other states) that Rudd gained in 2007 voted against this. If he had been more mentally stable then he could have been another Hawke or Blair - the kind of social democratic leader who can appeal to voters that just about any other leader can't appeal to - and been in office for about a decade.

But you can’t seperate Kevin’s psychosis from his success. Without it he never would’ve risen to the top in the first place, especially given the way he did it in ‘06.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

I put myself through the displeasure of watching ABC's Q&A the other week (if you don't know what that is, just stay that way)

I’ll take that as a comment (rip Tony  )

and it featured SA Premier Peter  Malinauskas, who had to toe a difficult line with an angry (anti-Voice) indigenous activist essentially accusing him of genocide on the one hand, a subtle acknowledgement that his state was likely to vote No on the other hand, and remain committed to Labor policy on the third hand.  He handled the whole thing quite well, actually!

SA Labor breeds very strong leaders, it’s really impressive how consistent they’ve been over the last 50 years. And it only accentuates the incompetence of SA Libs.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Just for the sake of interest, a map of the swing from the 1999 Republic referendum to the Voice.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Albanese had mentioned possibly holding a republican referendum in his second term, but the failure of the voice makes that unlikely now

I actually have a feeling a Republic referendum could pass. Republicanism seems to be a much more bipartisan idea than it was 25 years ago and it seems broadly popular.

And let's face it, Charlie doesn't have the emotional pull of his mother.

And honestly, it seems like the sort of idea that won't turn into a culture war. Neither the left or right particularly approve of the monarchy (apart from weirdo Abbott fans and middle-aged women).

It will absolutely turn into a polarised culture war because most Liberal MPs are monarchists and none of them want to hand Albo a win.

I can see the posters now…..

[AustralianSwingVoter]

There remains ~800k-1 million votes left to count nationwide over the next fortnight. This will mostly be Absents (only a quarter have been counted so far), some remaining uncounted Prepolls, all Provisionals (which are counted last) and late Postals.