Baseless fears about Rudd’s apology give hope for the Voice

In politics, old enmities die hard. Especially in Labor.

By contrast, Anthony Albanese, who voted for Beazley in 2006 but backed Rudd during the subsequent destructive civil war between Rudd and Gillard that erupted four years later, spoke effusively of his former leader at the portrait unveiling.

Albanese can only hope to leave a similar legacy with an achievement which involves a much higher degree of difficulty – a referendum.

Especially when it came to Rudd’s landmark apology to the stolen generations, one of his signature achievements.

His portrait features in the background three Indigenous totems as tribute to the apology.

Albanese can only hope to leave a similar legacy with a successful vote for the Indigenous Voice to parliament, an achievement which involves a much higher degree of difficulty – a referendum.

Not that Albanese ever took success for granted, but the mood is far more sober now than at the outset.

Hip to the beat

It was a year ago this month when such was the heady optimism swirling around the Voice that Albanese saw fit to ham it up alongside former US basketball star Shaquille “Shaq” O’Neal.

The PM and Shaq, who was in Australia to film a series of sports betting ads, staged a joint appearance at which Shaq, speaking in the third person, declared his love for Australia and assured Albanese that “whatever you need from me, just let me know”.

It was all a bit awkward and strange, but Albanese believed that enlisting the former NBA star would help raise awareness of the Voice, especially among the young.

To underscore this, the PM, too, was hip to the beat, daddy-o.

“Shaq has agreed to do some vids,” he said, “and to have a chat about the importance of bringing people together, and that’s really what the Voice to parliament is about”.

Safe to say, apart from the gambling ads that still festoon our screens, there’s been no sighting since of either Shaq or his “vids”.

It was not the only example of misplaced, if not well-intentioned, optimism.

Earlier this year, South Australian Labor Premier Peter Malinauskas brushed aside concerns that legislating his own Voice to parliament might only further serve to confuse voters who, by and large, still had no idea what the federal proposal was about.

Malinauskas argued the successful introduction of a Voice in SA would facilitate a Yes vote in the national referendum because it would demonstrate its benefits while also exposing the scare campaigns being mounted by opponents.

With great fanfare, the legislation passed the state parliament in March, but in June, the implementation – elections of Indigenous members of the Voice – was delayed from September to March because, the state government said, it was “causing confusion”.

Similarly, this week the West Australian government was backtracking at a rapid rate of knots by abolishing its Aboriginal cultural heritage legislation after just five weeks in operation. The legislation, drafted to stop of repeat of Rio Tinto’s 2020 destruction of the Juukan Gorge caves, was so onerous in its overreach that it quickly proved unworkable and wildly unpopular.

It required land owners to undertake in-depth heritage assessments and apply for permits even for minor works on any piece of land larger than 1100 square metres, often at great cost.

Voice needs Yes votes even from No states

The No camp quickly conflated the act it with the referendum, even though it had nothing to do with the Voice.

But during its short time in operation, the act drove down support for the Voice in a state where the Yes vote was always going to struggle – and now is almost certainly doomed.

In addition, it did nothing to stop the slide in support for Labor which has been noticeable in the west since the issues that drove Labor’s vote there at the last election – Scott Morrison, Clive Palmer, Christian Porter and Mark McGowan – either disappeared or faded from relevance.

On Wednesday night, just hours after WA Labor Premier Roger Cook apologised for the act and announced its abolition, Albanese was telling a WA trade and tourism function in Parliament House how important the state was, politically and economically.

“Before the last election, I made a commitment to visit Western Australia 10 times in my first year in office,” he said.

“I’m pleased that as prime minister I hit the mark ahead of schedule – and have now visited 14 times in 14 months.”

He’ll be there again soon, with the whole cabinet.

Although it is likely Labor will lose one or two seats in the west as the state, in the words of one WA Liberal this week, “starts to feel normal again”, it doesn’t mean you stop trying. The same with the Voice.

The referendum may be as good as lost in WA and Queensland, but to be successful it needs a double majority – a majority of the national vote and the support of least four of the six states.

The Yes vote in WA and Queensland will still be important if the former is to be achieved.

In unveiling his portrait, Rudd asked voters to consider the claims now being made about the Voice, saying similar fear-mongering which preceded the Apology proved baseless.

“I would simply reflect on this: fears were raised 15 years ago about why we should not do this thing called the Apology. Other fears are being raised today. I would simply ask all Australians to reflect on whether the fundamentals of whether those fears are justified or not.

“The arc of history bends slowly towards justice.”