Australians have resoundingly rejected a proposal to recognise Aboriginal people in its constitution and establish a body to advise parliament on Indigenous issues.
Saturday’s voice to parliament referendum failed, with the defeat clear shortly after polls closed.
I have no doubt that they would have stacked it. All governments try and do that, it’s not always malicious.
A yes vote would have indicated that the people feel quite strongly about it working though, and made it more heavily scrutinised when fiddled with.
“The constitutional voice” has a lot more gravity in a headline than “the indigenous advisory committee” or whatever, and news orgs are in the business of headlines.
Lets not sugar coat it, it’s a black day on our nation’s history.
It’s really not. We voted against something that we thought was a shit idea. If it was just about recognizing indigenous people as the original owners of the land etc it would have passed with flying colours. The government tried to bundle it with a vague and shitty proposal though, and in the process lost the recognition.