Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his partner Jodie Haydon have publicly shown their support for a treaty with First Nations people after the Voice – despite the PM telling Australia the vote over an Indigenous Voice to Parliament will have nothing to do with a treaty.
Mr Albanese repeatedly insisted that the proposed Indigenous advisory body was ‘not about a treaty’ during a fiery interview with broadcaster Ben Fordham on his 2GB radio show last Wednesday.
And now footage has since resurfaced of the prime minister donning a Midnight Oil T-shirt with the words ‘Voice, Truth, Treaty’ during a farewell gig in Sydney‘s Hordern Pavilion in October, just nine months ago.
This was three months after Mr Albanese outlined plans for holding a referendum recognising Aboriginal Australians in the constitution and introducing a Voice to Parliament, which is based on the Uluru Statement from the Heart.
Voice, Treaty and Truth are the three pillars of the Uluru Statement, which was released in 2017. Midnight Oil have been staunch supporters of the Uluru Statement from the Heart and the establishment of an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.
Mr Albanese’s partner, Ms Haydon, also wrote about her support for the Uluru Statement in several now deleted posts on her LinkedIn account.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese rocked out at the Midnight Oil farewell gig wearing the band’s ‘Voice, Treaty, Truth’ T-shirt at Sydney’s Hordern Pavilion last October. It was a band T-shirt
Ms Haydon used her social media profile to write about the ‘themes’ of the Uluru Statement from the Heart last year
In LinkedIn posts unearthed shortly after Mr Albanese’s election last year, Ms Haydon wrote: ‘For me this week I commit to reading again the ‘Uluru Statement from the Heart’ it has three themes: Voice. Treaty. Voice.’
‘We so desperately need a First Nations voice to parliament … it would become an institution of lasting significance for First Nations and all of Australia’.
In one post last year, she shared a cartoon of an Aboriginal rights protester with the caption: ‘Sovereignty has never been ceded. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. #ulurustatementfromtheheart #treaty #changethedate’, in which she appears to advocate for a treaty.
Ms Haydon deleted her LinkedIn profile when Daily Mail Australia published a story about her posts. She had previously declared she wanted to avoid making political commentary as the prime minister’s partner.
In his interview with Fordham, Mr Albanese said the Voice was not about reparations and repeatedly ‘this is not about a treaty’.
‘I can’t say it any clearer, compensation has nothing to do with what people will vote on later this year.’
Mr Fordham asked: ‘I’m talking about after that (the Voice). There are three stages, after we go through the Voice is it natural to assume after we go through the Voice?’
Mr Albanese said: ‘No, it’s not natural.’
But Mr Albanese has agreed to executing the Uluru Statement from the Heart ‘in the full’ – which includes a Makarrata Commission with an end goal of moving toward a treaty between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians.
Daily Mail Australia approached the Prime Minister’s office for comment.
Former prime minister Tony Abbott (pictured) criticised Mr Albanese’s choice of attire and labelled the Voice to Parliament a ‘power grab by activists’ during an interview on 2GB
READ MORE: Three pillars of the Voice to Parliament – Voice, Truth and Treaty
Polls show support for the Voice has remained just under 50 per cent, with recent surveys finding 48 per cent of voters would vote Yes and 52 per cent would vote No (pictured, Anthony Albanese is seen with First Nation caucus members (L-R) Malarndirri Mccarthy, Warren Snowdon, Linda Burney and Senator Pat Dodson at Parliament House)
Former prime minister Tony Abbott on Monday slammed Mr Albanese for wearing the band T-shirt when he spoke with Radio 2GB about the referendum. .
‘I suppose this is the problem when you turn yourself into a billboard,’ Mr Abbott said.
‘I go back to that initial statement that he made as prime minister, ‘The new government is committed to the Uluru Statement from the Heart in full’.
‘In other words, Voice, Treaty, Truth ‘in full’.’
‘That’s why it was as I said a moment of amnesia for the prime minister to deny here in this chair last week that the Voice had anything to do with treaty, it has everything to do with treaty.’
‘The whole point of having a Voice, if the activists are to be believed, is to start the treaty-making process. And government ministers have said as much.’
Australia is currently one of the only countries in the Commonwealth without a treaty with its First Nations peoples.
Mr Abbott, who has been one of the most outspoken critics of the Voice and arguably the most opposed to the proposal out of any former prime minister, told Fordham that he didn’t want to see Australia split by race.
‘I don’t want to see our country divided by ancestry or by race,’ he said.
‘I don’t want to see Indigenous separatism reinforced in out constitution and I don’t want to see the business of government gummed-up even further.’
This claim from Mr Abbott comes despite the fact the Australian constitution already refers to race in section 51 and section 25.
Attorney general Mark Dreyfus has also rejected claims the Voice would inject race into the constitution.
Mr Abbott argued that he was supportive of ‘Indigenous recognition’ but claimed the Voice was purely a ‘power grab by activists’.
‘We don’t give old people their own voice, we don’t give migrants a special voice, we don’t give young people or people with disabilities a special voice,’ he said.
‘Everyone has the same voice in the national parliament, and now there are 11 Indigenous people in the national parliament.’
‘That’s a very good voice for Indigenous people and let’s keep the national parliament as the one voice for all of us.’
Mr Abbott also lambasted ‘woke companies’ providing an ‘avalanche of money’ to the Yes campaign.
Fordham asked why Mr Abbott why he didn’t push for constitutional recognition of Indigenous people during his time as prime minister.
Mr Abbott responded that he ‘got rolled’ before he was able to do so.
When asked why the Coalition never followed through with Indigenous recognition after he left office, Mr Abbott claimed it got ‘sidetracked’ by the Uluru Statement from the Heart.
It comes as polls show support for the Voice has remained just under 50 per cent, with Two Resolve Political Monitor surveys conducted for The Sydney Morning Herald finding 48 per cent of voters would vote Yes and 52 per cent would vote No.
The referendum for the Voice to Parliament is expected to be held sometime between October and December this year.
