ACT's citizen of the year calls on Canberrans to vote 'yes'

I had the privilege of chairing our local voice, the ACT Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elected Body in its previous term.

There are a couple of things I want to say to the Canberra community, a community I love.

If we truly want a united Australia then surely that means we want a country where any child born today has the same expectations for their health, education and employment across their life.

This is not the case right now and all the evidence tells us better results are delivered when the people affected are directly involved in the solutions.

Look at the remarkable outcomes during COVID because Indigenous health services and leaders were at the table from the start ensuring the needs of Indigenous Australians were part of the decision making process every step of the way.

I travelled across Australia and was part of the Voice co-design discussions with Indigenous people in cities, in the regions and in remote locations. I heard clearly the overwhelming support to elect the people to speak on the issues that affect them.

For most Australians the most the Voice will cost them is the time it takes to cast their vote. For Indigenous Australians the costs are counted in life years.

"Yes" makes a better future possible for all of us.

As the Sydney Opera House lit up with the flag of Israel, Israel's Defence Minister Yoav Gallant announced the entire population of Gaza would be subjected to a total siege: water, food, medicine and electricity were all to be cut off. "We are fighting human animals" he said.

To make hearing that the Israelis were going to continue to treat Palestinians as less than human worse, I was amazed to hear Senator Wong, found it difficult to judge Israel's military response, which includes the blockade, "from a distance".

Her lack of understanding of international law is very concerning. The Geneva Convention, Article 33, clearly defines collective punishment of civilian populations as a war crime.

In contrast to her statement, the Secretary General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, and the EU's chief diplomat, Josep Borrell, both spoke with clarity and integrity on this issue.

Mr Borrell said that: "Some of the actions ... [such] as cutting water, cutting electricity, cutting food to a mass of civilian people is against international law".

The Australian government should urgently publicly clarify its position on this matter.

The number of civilians killed and wounded as a result of cutting water, food, electricity and medicine and generally treating Palestinians in Gaza as less than human is likely to increase greatly in the coming days, weeks and months.

If the referendum debate has had an up side it has been to shine a much needed light on the desperate circumstances suffered by too many Indigenous Australians.

It has also exposed the usually costly, but largely unsuccessful, efforts by successive governments to address that disadvantage.

None of us can now be in any doubt that there are significant challenges to address.

In response to Shirley Ferguson's question (Letters, October 11) of "what happens after the Voice referendum?" the answer must include a national plan that is transparent, regularly monitored and reported, and over-sighted by a competent, accountable entity.

For far too long such matters have been left to a token B team, unaccountable for their lack of progress and gross expenditure.

With the need to remove Indigenous community disadvantage finally recognised as a national priority, it must be addressed accordingly.

We've been talking about it for long enough.

You have to wonder at the editorial standards of The Canberra Times letters page. Is it cultivating ground to encourage good faith arguments or just letting biofuel grow wild, regardless of the pyromaniacs that will inevitably come along?

Had it a clear purpose, pernicious lies about the Voice, linking it with extremism for example, would never get published, far less called a good reason to vote "no" (Letters, October 2).

Instead, The Canberra Times hedges its bets, both wringing its hands at the dishonesty of much of the "no" campaign and cosseting it. It needs to do far better.

Should the "no" vote exceed the "yes" vote all those corporate big-wigs, political, academic, sporting, religious, showbiz and other luminaries will then no doubt agree with Shakespeare's: "Thou have done well; for wisdom cries out from the streets, and no man regards it".

Not to mention William Wordsworth's: "Wisdom is oft times nearer when we stoop, than when we soar".

There is much angst about why the Voice needs to be embedded in the constitution.

The plain and simple answer is that it has to be, in the same way as our first nations peoples have been embedded in this land since before history began, and long before European occupation.

What is the headline that Australians want the world to wake up to on Sunday morning?

Please let it be that we are willing to recognise our first Australians, and to listen to them. For it to be otherwise is unthinkable. Vote "yes".

There are many Canberrans through your letters pages who advocate, vehemently, for a "no" vote this weekend - together with a variety of reasons for such a vote, starting with equality and ending in racism.

Nobody, however, has been able to articulate just how a "yes" vote will affect them. It's a simple question and one that should be asked. What is it about giving First Nations people recognition in our constitution that will so upset lives in Canberra?

That it can improve the lives of many First Nations people should be sufficient reason to vote a resounding "yes".

In 2004 the Howard government abolished the representative Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC), declaring that "the experiment in elected representation for Indigenous people has been a failure". Mark Latham, then Labor opposition leader, endorsed Howard's decision.

In 2007, Howard mandated the Northern Territory "intervention", suspending the Racial Discrimination Act in respect of most Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory.

The Rudd-Gillard governments shifted to a more positive policy rhetoric but made little or no improvement in the lived reality.

In 2015, then prime minister Abbott refused to further "subsidise" the uneconomic "lifestyle choices" of remote Aboriginal communities remaining on their traditional lands.

Peter Dutton, was one of only six MPs to boycott the Apology in 2008.

I feel deep regret modern Australia has tolerated these discriminatory behaviours.

The Victorian senator putting his name to the recent "no" vote advertisement on the front page of The Canberra Times proclaiming "if you don't know, vote "no" does a grave disservice to those still wavering and even those committed for that reason.

It is offensive and arrogant to be told by the "no" promoters "you are a fool, don't think, don't enquire, waste your democratic right". They further ridicule those groups by being asked to accept the wholly incorrect and preposterous assertions, among others, that voting "yes" might somehow give the Voice a veto over Australian law or take Australia from its citizens. Take what and to where, exactly?

I have yet to detect in any argument against the Voice an element of goodwill or humility.

For me, the saddest message during the campaign is the "no" case's slogan, "If you don't know, vote 'no'."

It gives the finger to democracy.

If people genuinely don't know, then logically they should vote informal. It is always better of course to find out, but voting "no" out of ignorance is harmful and misrepresents the true community feeling.

Australia is better than negative slogans. Peter Dutton and others in the "no" camp have much to answer for.

Your editorial on the pro-Palestinian rally was shockingly one-sided ("Greens support for pro-Palestinian rally shocks Canberrans", October 12) . I regard it as poor journalism that debases the standing of The Canberra Times. Shame.

Vote "yes" to move Australia to a new level of togetherness, trust and fairness. Give the Indigenous people of Australia equity to improve their quality of life.

Marx described religion as "the opiate of the masses" because it disconnected disadvantaged people from the here and now. He might have been describing described "social media" which has done so much damage to the referendum.

What connects the weekend referendum and the unfolding tragedy of cycles of retaliatory violence in the Middle East? As Albert Einstein said, "No problem can be solved by the same consciousness that caused it in the first place".

A "yes" advocate at the polling place informed me that "only a small percentage of Aborigines are expected to vote no". When I asked how many she told me 20 per cent. So one in five first nations people don't trust the government.

If we vote "no", what will we have to show for it? Only, I fear, that freedom to choose means the people, however ill-informed, have the right to be wrong.

Unlike Brian Wenn (Letters, October 11), I don't take my advice on constitutional change from pop singers. Or footballers. Or shoe salesman.

If we vote "no" we go nowhere. Same old, same old. If we vote "yes" we give hope and move forward.

Anthony Albanese's brief initial public statement on this latest war in Palestine describes the Palestinian attacks as "unprovoked". Astonishing, but true. Unless he has become a spokesman for Israel or the Council of Australian Jewry, and he is inherently part of the problem, could someone please arrange formal neurocognitive testing for him, pronto?

Just letting you know that everything is going to be okay in the current Middle East crisis because world leaders on both sides have "condemned the violence".

Who would have thought that 2017 would be the last good year? Some things like peace, global health and a liveable climate you don't really appreciate until they start slipping away. The worst part is we've done this to ourselves.