Voice backers call for support

UNIVERSITIES and academics should feel comfortable speaking out on the upcoming Voice to Parliament referendum, according to a former chief executive of the Kimberley Land Council.

Nolan Hunter, who was chief executive of the native title group in the 2010s and is currently listed as a director of Ambooriny Burru Foundation, is a member of the Uluru Dialogue, which is based at The University of New South Wales, Sydney, and involves itself in public education campaigns on the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

That document was authored in 2017 and outlines support by first nations people for a constitutionally enshrined Voice to Parliament.

As part of the dialogue’s work ahead of a referendum, expected to be held before the end of the year, the group has launched a Western Australia-targeted television campaign, narrated by actor Trevor Jamieson and explaining the process behind the Voice’s creation.

Mr Hunter told Business News he found Australians were more willing to support a constitutionally enshrined Voice if they were provided information on the subject.

“We want people to be informed,” he said.

“People are reacting negatively sometimes because they’ve listened to the politicians playing political games or [spreading] misinformation, or even [coming up against] a lack of information.

“What we find, because we’ve been going through this process since Uluru in terms of campaigning to raise awareness and education, … as people have information, access to understanding and information, then they’re ready and able and willing to support it.”

 Recent polling by Nine Entertainment and Seven West Media respectively shows 52 per cent and 60 per cent of Western Australians will support a ‘yes’ vote at referendum.

Widespread public support does not appear to have translated to the business community, however, with the likes of Fortescue Metals Group and Mineral Resources expressing muted support or no stance on the subject of a Voice to Parliament.

Megan Davis, an academic at UNSW who co-chairs the Uluru Dialogue with Pat Anderson, has been critical of organisations going quiet on the issue, telling a Universities Australia audience in February that higher education institutions declining to take a public stance to avoid being involved in a political debate was itself a political decision.

UNSW is one of a handful of Australian universities explicitly backing a ‘yes’ vote at referendum. Most universities in WA have yet to take a stance on the referendum.

That includes: the University of Western Australia, which told Business News the Voice was ‘an important issue’ but declined to state a position; Curtin University, which pointed to the executive and council’s previously stated support for the Uluru Statement from the Heart; and The University of Notre Dame, which said in a statement it was yet to finalise its position on the subject.

ECU has come closest, with deputy vice-chancellor for students, equity and Indigenous, Braden Hill, a personal supporter of the Voice, saying the issue would be considered at a council level.

No response was received from Murdoch University.

Mr Hunter, while cautioning he wasn’t personally involved in the higher education sector, insisted there was a role for academia in the campaign.

“If the whole process is about awareness and education, these educational institutions involve themselves in public policy, in research, on a number of areas of significance around many social and political issues in this country,” he said.

“So why wouldn’t there be this level of consistency?”

He argued the issue of a Voice should be seen as above politics.

“This has nothing to do with political issues,” Mr Hunter said.

“This has got to do with how people’s circumstances need to change.”

While support for the Voice is consistent across Labor and Greens MPs, federal Nationals MPs resolved to oppose it late last year, with federal Liberal frontbenchers also tied to backing the ‘no’ campaign.

Mr Hunter seemed unbothered by the political dimensions of the referendum, saying he would be urging Australians to ignore politicians when arguing for a ‘yes’ vote.

“It’s the Australian people who are the key here,” he said. “It’s not up to the politicians.”