New study explores attitudes toward reconciliation

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Serious questions are being raised about how the Indigenous voice to parliament failed after a new study found an overwhelming majority of people think first nations people should have a say in matters affecting them. The Australian National University surveyed more than 4-thousand voters to help explain what happened and researchers say while the results mostly confirm what they suspected, there were a few surprises.

Transcript

00:00 What the survey has indicated, you know, a majority of those surveyed had said they voted

00:06 no for fear that it would divide the nation.

00:11 And we did hear that rhetoric all throughout the campaign.

00:15 I think what was really hard for people is that two of the most prominent no campaigners

00:22 were Indigenous people, you know, spreading lies and disinformation and making people

00:28 believe that by Indigenous people having an advisory body to government, it would in fact

00:34 divide the nation.

00:36 So I do understand why people would fear that.

00:38 But what we know is that it didn't divide the nation by having these conversations about

00:45 Indigenous affairs.

00:46 It hasn't divided the nation by increasing the spotlight on disadvantage and gaps that

00:53 Indigenous people are facing.

00:55 And in fact, it has brought a lot of people together.

00:59 And what we know now is that a lot more Australians are talking about this, not just talking about

01:05 the gaps, but talking about the solutions.

01:08 So whilst it is very, very disappointing that, you know, like we thought, and this survey

01:14 indicates that a lot of people who voted no did so out of fear, fear of things that were

01:21 really baseless.

01:22 So have you taken heart from this survey and where to from here?

01:26 Look, what we've taken heart from is the conversations that have happened following the referendum.

01:33 We have over 70,000 active volunteers that were established during the campaign.

01:38 And we need to acknowledge this was the biggest campaign this nation has seen.

01:43 And it was put together in less than 12 months.

01:46 And it resulted in over 6 million people voting yes.

01:49 It resulted in a number of people coming aboard, tens of thousands of people coming on board

01:53 to ensure that we reconcile, we move forward as a country and that Indigenous voices are

01:58 heard.

01:59 So moving forward.

02:00 But the reality is that that vote started a lot higher and dropped away really significantly

02:05 despite all the efforts of the yes campaign.

02:08 Well, look, and the thing about the campaign is we spent far too much time having to talk

02:14 about what the proposal wasn't rather than what it was.

02:18 We spent far too much time dispelling lies and disinformation.

02:22 So rather than being out there talking about the positive impacts that a voice would have

02:26 had on the ground, we spent a lot of our time convincing people that it wouldn't take their

02:31 backyard so that an advisory body to government would not close beaches and do land grabs

02:37 and all of the other lies that we saw through the campaign.

02:40 So unfortunately, we saw lies, we saw political football.

02:43 And what we didn't see is enough time spent talking about the positive impact that a voice,

02:48 that an advisory body to government would have.

02:50 Yeah, but that advisory body to parliament, that advisory body to parliament, despite

02:55 the wishes of the yes campaign is just not going to happen now.

02:59 So where to from here in terms of trying to pursue some form of reconciliation?

03:07 Look, we don't think that reconciliation is dead.

03:11 What we think is that the conversation has really increased.

03:15 We now have a nation that is more informed, more empathetic, more aware of the issues

03:21 that we're facing and the solutions that are possible.

03:23 And we've seen that in the survey results, that people do agree, a majority of Australians

03:29 do agree that an Indigenous voice will be a part of the solution.

03:34 So in terms of constitutional recognition, I still feel that is incredibly important.

03:40 We've made huge progress on that agenda.

03:43 And look, it may mean that we keep talking about it for another couple of decades, but

03:47 we keep going.

03:48 And we did see out of those survey results as well, what we thought is that the younger

03:52 generations are really supportive of this.

03:55 And these will be the future generations that pick up and run with the work that has already

03:59 begun.

04:00 And when you say this, are you talking about constitutional recognition or an advisory

04:03 voice, voice to an advisory group to parliament?

04:07 So both are really important.

04:09 It's obviously important for all the reasons we've discussed to have a voice.

04:12 But I also believe it's very important to enshrine that voice in the constitution.

04:16 And we talked about this all year.

04:18 We want to get off the cycle of political football.

04:23 We want to get off the cycle of governments being able to silence voices that are established

04:27 because we know that that is harmful to people.

04:30 We know that it's a waste of taxpayers' money.

04:32 And we know that the solution is in the constitution by safely securing a voice in the constitution.

04:39 And that's something we will continue to fight for.

04:41 So you think that Australia should go back to the polls for a referendum on some kind

04:47 of indigenous advisory group to parliament within the next couple of decades?

04:52 At some point I would hope that that's exactly what we do.

04:55 And I think that this survey shows that increasingly Australians are understanding why that is

05:00 necessary.

05:01 And if we can get rid of the disinformation and the lies and the political football, then

05:08 we will actually have a real chance of this.

05:10 We did see two main people actively try to tear this campaign apart.

05:16 They didn't put the priorities of indigenous people first.

05:19 They didn't put the closing the gap goals that we had first.

05:23 They played games with this.

05:25 And if we can move past that sort of thing, and I think Australians are showing this.

05:29 The other thing is Australians do not have a lot of confidence in the political system

05:33 right now.

05:34 And politicians need to do better.

05:36 Australians are watching very carefully and we just saw this play out right in front of

05:39 us.

05:40 So I think that the nation expects more.

05:44 They expect good, clean campaigns.

05:46 And I think if we were to do this again in a few decades, then we would see a much more

05:50 clean version of this where disinformation and lies just would not be accepted by the

05:57 public.

05:58 Thank you.

05:58 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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