Support for treaty slumps in another blow for Indigenous Australians after Voice to Parliament defeat

Support for a treaty with First Nations people has waned, while approval for a truth commission has languished after the Voice referendum was rejected.

Only around a third of voters now support these measures, which along with the Voice were the three pillars of the Uluru Declaration from the Heart that the Albanian government had pledged to fulfill.

Support for the treaty has fallen from 58 percent in October to 33 percent this month, according to a Resolve Political Monitor survey conducted for the Nine News mastheads.

Meanwhile, only 34 percent are in favor of a body that tells the truth, while 31 percent are against and 34 percent have not yet made a decision.

This clouds the future of the Makarrata Commission, the intended truth-telling body for which it allocated $5.8 million in the 2022 budget.

Indigenous Affairs Minister Linda Burney said this week that the government is “taking the time to pause and listen to Indigenous communities before we decide on the next steps forward.”

“I met with my state and territory colleagues and received an update on what each jurisdiction is doing in terms of setting up representative bodies, telling the truth and making agreements,” Ms Burney said.

In the wake of The Voice’s resounding defeat in the October 14 referendum, in which more than 60 percent of voters rejected the proposal, even support for simple constitutional recognition has fallen from 58 percent to 48 percent in a month.

Resolve Director Jim Reed noted that this measure has previously always been supported by a majority of voters.

“It’s collapsed now, so in many ways the baby has been thrown out with the bathwater,” Reed told the newspaper. Sydney Morning Herald.

Before the referendum, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese ruled out the existence of the Voice by law and there is little public support for him to do so now.

The Resolve poll found that only 40 percent would support such a move, down from 49 percent in January, while 40 percent oppose it and 20 percent remain undecided.

Despite declining support for the Treaty, some states are still pursuing this.

There is already a First People’s Assembly in Victoria and the Labor Allan government remains fully committed to negotiating a treaty with the organization.

In NSW, $5 million has been spent on a consultation process for a similar policy, although Premier Chris Minns recently said any action would be put on hold until after the next state election.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese must pick up the pieces of his government’s reconciliation plan

A legislated Pathway to Treaty was underway in Queensland, but it hit a wall when the LNP withdrew their support last month and Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said she would only move forward with a bipartisan commitment.

The South Australian government passed legislation on a state-based vote for parliament in March, but postponed elections for the body until March 2024.

Weatherill’s Labor government began a state treaty process in 2016, but this was halted by the previous Liberal government in 2018 and the current Labor government has yet to restart the process.

Western Australia currently has no treaty or plans to tell the truth, but some lawyers and academics call the South West Native Title Settlement between the Noongar people and the state government Australia’s first treaty.

Premier Roger Cook said a state vote was not on the agenda and sought to remind people that the state’s constitution was amended in 2015 to recognize Aboriginal people.

The previous state government led by former Premier Mark McGowan began plans to establish an Indigenous representative body in Western Australia in 2018.