THE HON MARK DREYFUS KC MP
ATTORNEY-GENERAL
CABINET SECRETARY
MEMBER FOR ISAACS
E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC AM
FRIDAY, 24 MARCH 2023
SUBJECT: The Voice to Parliament; Parliament House protest; Peter Dutton’s refusal to condemn Moira Deeming.
SABRA LANE: The Federal Government has fine-tuned the wording around the question Australians will be asked to vote on in a referendum later this year about a Constitutional change that would allow the setting up of an Indigenous Voice to Parliament. The Voice, as it's been called, would be a permanent body representing First Nations people. It would advise government on policies and laws which affect their lives, but it wouldn't be able to deliver programs and it would have no veto power over Parliament. But is it enough to win bipartisan support for the referendum? The Federal Liberal Party is still undecided. The Federal Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus joined me a short time ago. Mark Dreyfus, the Prime Minister says the referendum will be an inspiring and unifying moment but what if it's a no result? What kind of moment will that be for the country?
ATTORNEY-GENERAL MARK DREYFUS: We're focused on success Sabra. I think it's important to not let moments like yesterday pass. We too often quickly move on in this Parliament House and yesterday was a really momentous day. It was a day when we've announced the final wording of the amendment to the Constitution that we're going to bring to the Parliament next week in a Constitution Alteration Bill. First time that's happened for 23 years, and it's a tremendous opportunity for our country.
LANE: Does it weigh on you?
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: It very much weighs on me. My very first job out of university was working with the Northern Land Council, a land rights organisation in the Northern Territory, and I've been working with Aboriginal organisations, not continuously, but on and off for about 40 years and this is a really important moment for our country. It will improve the country, as the Prime Minister said yesterday, and it will improve our standing in the rest of the world. The world is looking at what we are doing and I'm hoping that every Australian can bring themselves to vote Yes when we hold the referendum later this year.
LANE: You need a majority of voters across the country, a majority of states backing the change and usually you need bipartisan support in getting referenda up. Bipartisanship now looks impossible. The Government did provide more details yesterday on how the representatives would be chosen for the Voice, their terms, the composition and the phrasing around the legislative power of Parliament was added. But this all seems to apparently have just hardened the Liberals’ opposition to this. Are you prepared to lay out more detail ahead of the referendum if that's what it takes to get the Liberals on board?
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: We are still hoping that the Opposition will get on board. I urge Mr Dutton and his colleagues to support this referendum. It's a really important step for our country. And, of course, we're going to keep talking to the Opposition, just as we have been listening to the community, listening to First Nations leaders since the election and getting this right. We are going to keep listening to what the Opposition has to say and do everything that we can to get them on board.
LANE: Liberal Leader Peter Dutton says the wording still may not be enough to satisfy some of his colleagues within the party. As you say the bill will be introduced next week with an immediate inquiry and a vote in June. Is that leaving this all too late?
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: I think that we need to also remember the path that we've traveled to get to this point. We've been talking about recognition of our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples for decades. The process that led to the Uluru Statement from the Heart in 2017 started in 2010. There have been Parliamentary inquiries. There have been conventions, there have been dialogues, and after the Uluru Statement from the Heart, that generous offer to the whole of our country, after that we had in the last two Parliaments further Parliamentary inquiries. The time is here, the time is now to get on with this and I don't think we've left it too late. I think we are at the end of a process. We're now going to introduce the bill in Parliament next week and it will go, as you have said, to a Joint Select Committee to examine, have another public inquiry and that'll be another opportunity for people to put forward views. And then the bill will be debated in the House of Representatives and in the Senate and by the end of June we'll be headed to the referendum.
LANE: I know that you're focused on getting a Yes but don't we need to examine the consequences of, if that does not happen? Don't people need to understand that? What do you think the consequences will be?
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: I think it would be a very long time before we returned to any question of recognition. I think it would be a tremendous setback for relations with our First Peoples and I'm focused on success because the consequences of failure would be dire.
LANE: You say that you're still talking with the Opposition. Is there a chance that you will provide more details or do you see this through the prism that former High Court Judge Kenneth Hayne does? He says asking for more details is just a distraction.
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: In many ways the requests for details, or the asking of questions, were asking questions that Mr Dutton already knew the answers to. So you do have to think well, why are all these questions still being asked? I'd invite Mr Dutton to have a long, hard think and a long hard look at the simple words that we've unveiled yesterday and the simple question that will be put to the Australian people on referendum day and look into his heart and think about the tremendous improvement that this will be for our country. If we have recognition of our First Peoples in the Constitution, and a Voice to make representations to the Parliament and the executive on matters that concern Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, that will be a tremendous step forward. Putting this in the Constitution is a tremendous step forward and I hope he can bring himself and his party to support this.
LANE: You've sought urgent advice from the Australian Federal Police Commissioner about what happened yesterday at a protest outside Parliament House where independent Senator Lidia Thorpe was knocked to the ground while she was trying to make an appearance there. Have you got that advice back?
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: Not yet. And obviously, the footage was concerning. The AFP has announced that it has referred that incident to the AFPs Professional Standards Command for investigation.
LANE: Before you go, do you regret your attack on Mr Dutton earlier this week, accusing him of silence regarding the protests in Victoria where Nazis were present?
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: No I don't. There's no place in Australian society for public displays of Nazi symbols or the Nazi salute and Mr Dutton has still not uttered a word of condemnation of a Victorian Liberal Member of Parliament, Moira Deeming, for her attendance at that disgraceful rally in Melbourne. The Liberal Leader of the Opposition in Victoria, Mr Pesutto, moved immediately to expel Moira Deeming from the Liberal Party. Mr Dutton can't even bring himself to mention her name.
LANE: He sought to bring forward a Private Member's Bill in Parliament this week banning Nazi symbols.
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: That was not the point that I made in the Parliament. I called on Mr Dutton to join the Leader of the Opposition in Victoria in condemning the actions of a Liberal Member of Parliament in Victoria and he still hasn't done this. Meanwhile, senior members of his front bench, and I'm talking Senator Henderson, Senator Antic, and Senator Canavan are endorsing Ms Deeming and apparently working to undermine the Liberal Leader of the Opposition in Victoria for daring to stand up to the right wing extremists in the Liberal Party. So, no, I don't regret what I said about Mr Dutton at all and I'm still calling on him to condemn the actions of the Liberal in Victoria. He is the senior Liberal in Australia and it's up to him to stand up to this kind of behaviour.
LANE: Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus thanks for joining am.
ATTORNEY-GENERAL: Thank you very much.
ENDS
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