Richard
Ah Mat
Cape
York Land Council
Address
to the Treaty Conference
Murdoch
University
Introduction
We
have to get real about the Holy Grail
The
lessons from ‘67
We
must show that self determination can work in practice – and we must get
ourselves organised at the regional level
How
do we get 80-90% of the country to support a treaty?
·
51%
clockwise strategies
·
90%
counter clockwise strategies
What
is involved in moving towards a Treaty?
·
5%
legal and political theory
·
5%
constitutional mechanism
·
90%
political strategy and prosecution
Conclusion:
Leadership and Unity
Introduction
Let
me first pay my respects to the traditional owners of Perth and to all
indigenous peoples from across the country who are with us at this conference.
I thank the organisers and participants for this opportunity to share our
views with you. I bring greetings
and best wishes from our people in Cape York Peninsula.
We have to get real
about the Holy Grail
Who
in the audience knows what is a Holy Grail or what is the Holy
Grail? We’ve all probably used
the phrase “we’re searching for the Holy Grail”, “I found the Holy
Grail”, but how many of us have ever understood what in the hell it is?
Many of us have probably used the phrase to express the search for or
achievement of goals a lot less lofty, a lot less chivalrous, a lot less
spiritual – than was intended by the saintly people of medieval times.
Until
two days ago I too had no clue what the hell the Holy Grail was.
And I’ve seen as many movies about knights in armour galloping around
on horses, as anyone. I’ve even seen the movie with the knights who gallop around
on their own two legs, clapping coconuts together.
To
this day I’ve never known what the Holy Grail was.
I just had some vague thought that it was some kind of cloak or robe…or
was it King Arthur’s sword…or what the hell was it?
Anyway this is the definition that the dictionary on Microsoft Word gives
of the Holy Grail:
“according
to medieval legend, the cup said to be used by Jesus Christ at the Last Supper,
and by Joseph of Arimathea to collect his blood and sweat at the Crucifixion”.
The
notion of a Treaty between the indigenous people of Australia and the
Commonwealth Government on behalf of the non-indigenous people of Australia –
has become something of a Holy Grail to progressive politics in our country.
This Holy Grail is indeed the subject of this very conference.
The
Treaty has become a Holy Grail for a number of reasons:
One
reason is that the Treaty is seen as the ultimate political destination
for the Aboriginal rights movement. It
is political heaven. It is that
point over the horizon where reconciliation prevails and everything is sweetness
and light. It is the place where
the meek inherit the earth and all social and economic ills are a thing of the
past. Wounds will be healed, the
blind will see, the lame shall walk again.
If not Heaven on Earth, then it may be the kind of Utopia that the
socialists had in mind when they dreamed of a better future for the Workers of
the World.
I
am of course slightly exaggerating the hopes that people have for a treaty –
but probably not as much as I think. The
Treaty is seen as some kind of
Nirvana.
Another
reason is that the Treaty represents the legal and political instrument that
will put paid to all ambiguity and argument.
It will be a final settlement of all political and legal
disputation about the place of Aboriginal people in the Australian nation.
It will be the mother of all comprehensive settlements, and it will
contain every solution to every conceivable problem – including
those things that we cannot now conceive of as issues to resolve.
Like
the Holy Grail, we are all agreed on its fundamental importance and that it is
the crusade that we must all embark upon – and yet we are unclear what we mean
by it. We are very vague
about what is the destination that we are seeking.
To what new land over the horizon are we seeking to travel?
And how will we know when we have arrived?
What will the Holy Grail look like…if we don’t have a detailed
picture of it, do we have anything more detailed than some generally misty,
cloudy place behind which lies a place called Heaven?
And how come we have been talking about a treaty for nearly three decades now and yet our general understanding of it is not a great deal advanced beyond the concept of some kind of profound agreement between black and white? We are still unclear on basic questions like:
· who will be the parties to the Treaty?
· who will represent the Aboriginal parties?
· what authority will the Aboriginal parties have to negotiate the treaty?
· what authority will they have to sign the treaty?
·
is there a treaty or treaties?
And
so on and so on.
Or
has the quest for the Holy Grail become more important than actually finding
the bloody thing? Will we be
psychologically capable of seizing the Grail when we come upon it?
Will we be prepared to pull the sword from the stone?
Or is our hesitation about reaching such a moment of historical
decisiveness – where we have to make a settlement with those who have
colonised our people and our country – the thing that makes it more
comfortable for us to float around in a fog of vagueness, rhetoric and mournful
hope?
The message from the leaders from my region is this: we have to get real about the Holy Grail. We can’t continue to stumble around – in full metal armour – on poor, bony and starving horses – charging at wind mills on the horizon. We need first:
· to know what we are looking for
· to work out a plan to get there
·
to ride forward deliberately and carefully, and in accordance with the
plan
Those
of us with our heads in the clouds must think about descending to Planet Earth,
or at least somewhere approximately within orbit of it. ATSIC must stop authorising any travel request forms for
those who wish to continue their travels to Outer Space.
Those
of us who are plunging swords into the backs of our troops and who are using our
leaders for archery target practice – must attend re-training classes so that
we can properly recognise who the real enemies are.
Those
of us who are devouring our own horses – must reconsider the wisdom of doing
this and realise that we will have need for them in the long march ahead of us.
The
point is: we have to get real. If
we’re gonna talk about a treaty, let’s talk in the here and now. Let’s be ambitious, but let us also be realistic.
Let’s be hopeful, but let’s not be naïve.
Above all, let us realise that we are not seeking to recreate heaven on
earth. We are instead seeking a political and moral reconciliation
between the old and new Australians in relation to matters of great significance
and importance to human beings who live in a real world, whose futures must
necessarily be founded upon coexistence.
The lessons from ‘67
The
first reality check that we have to face up to is this: what lessons do
we take from the 1967 Referendum which finally included Aboriginal people as
Australians citizens?
Before
I talk about what we from Cape York think are the lessons from ’67, let me
first clarify that I am talking about the concept of a Treaty which is founded
upon amendment of the Australian Constitution.
I am not talking about Treaty in the sense of an agreement between two
international nations, and I am not talking about an agreement that is set out
in legislation enacted by the Commonwealth Parliament.
I am talking about what I think we should be talking about – that is, a
Treaty that is backed by amendment to the Australian Constitution.
Michael
Dodson spoke about this at the 20th anniversary of the commencement
of the Mabo Case, held at Townsville last year.
In his address to the conference, Mick spoke about one of the 4 options
discussed by the Senate Standing Committee on Constitutional and Legal Affairs
in its Makarrata Report in the early 1980s.
We
in Cape York are in agreement with Mick Dodson that the option that he has
discussed, is the best option for a Treaty.
Now
the lessons that we should take from 1967 are pretty obvious. They are as follows:
1.
The ’67 Referendum was passed by 90 something % of the Australian
electorate. We are constantly told
that the Australian Constitution is one of the hardest constitutions in the
world to change, because you need “a majority of voters in a majority of the
states”. So you need 80-90% of
the country to support the change.
2.
To get 80-90% of the country to support a Referendum, you need bipartisan
political support. And you need
support from the States and Territories as well, so that they’re not running a
“NO” case against you.
3.
In order to get bipartisan support, you will need a conservative
government to propose the amendment and you need Labor to offer bipartisan
support. It is unlikely that you
will get bipartisan support the other way around.
In 1967 the conservative government of Harold Holt proposed the amendment
and it was supported by the Whitlam Labor Opposition.
4.
To get 80-90% of the country you need to convince rural, conservative
and regional Australia of the need for change.
In other words you need to convince those people who usually vote for the
National Party.
5.
It took 10 years of outstanding and dignified advocacy by Indigenous
leaders like Faith Bandler and the late Pastor Doug Nichols and many others, to
build the groundswell of support across the political spectrum.
The indigenous leadership of this period was smart, dignified, very
capable and very united. In
sharp contrast to our leadership today.
Those
who think that the Treaty is somehow a “radical” cause or a “radical”
option, need to think again. If
you want a treaty to turn into reality you need to have a strategy of convincing
conservative and regional Australia in favour of your cause.
Do you really think that conservative and regional Australia are going to
simply put their hands up and say “YES” to something that is sold to them as
a radical cause?
We
have to get real. If we talk
treaty, we need to talk about how we’re going to get 80-90% of the country to
back us in a Referendum. Otherwise
we are just kidding ourselves.
One
last lesson that we should take from ’67.
The question of recognising Aboriginal people as citizens of Australia
was a pretty easy question in the whole scheme of things.
It would have been ridiculous for Australia to have gone on much
further in its history without addressing this racist exclusion of its
indigenous peoples from the Constitution. White
Australia was not being asked to give anything substantial to black fellas in
1967 .
When
we talk about a treaty that is aimed at settling questions to do with the rights
of our people and dealing with contentious questions of land rights, economic
development and governance – then you really are asking the hard questions.
The constitutional change needed to underpin a Treaty is a much harder
and a much more complicated question than the question of whether
Aboriginal people should be counted as citizens of their own country.
We must show that self
determination can work in practice – and we must get ourselves organised at
the regional level
The
question of self determination and governance will be central questions
for a treaty. It is sure to be one
of the most contentious issues.
Our
view from Cape York is that we must show that self determination can work in
practice – on the ground, in our regions, in our communities, in our
traditional owner groups. The
problem with our talk about self determination, is that in practice we are severely
disorganised and disunited. So
whilst self determination is easy to talk about in theory, we are not
translating it into reality – and doing the hard yards to make
indigenous governance work amongst our people.
The
levels of disputation, division, jealousy, infighting, power-plays,
backstabbing, mistrust – are very, very high amongst our people. Our organisations don’t work together. Leaders won’t cooperate with one another, whether at the
community or the regional or the national levels.
There
is a breakdown of Aboriginal Law and authority – and as a result our
families and communities are falling apart with no law and order. Our social problems are in no small part due to the breakdown
of governance within our own communities.
If
we won all of the necessary legal and political victories tomorrow – that gave
us the fullest right to self determination within this country – what would it
mean in reality? I don’t think it
would mean much. It would not mean
much because self determination is about practice, it is about actions,
it is about what we do from day to day to make changes, it is about governance.
It is about taking responsibility for our problems and for our
opportunities: because nobody else will take responsibility for our families,
our children, our people. We
have to do it ourselves.
Our
view from Cape York is that we must get organised around the regions.
There are, and there always will be, three main levels of Aboriginal
community – national, regional and local.
We believe that the regional level of governance needs to be developed.
We need Aboriginal organisations to be united and working together at the
regional level. It is at this level
that our people can have the necessary scale and political organisation and
capacity – to deal with governments and the outside world. It is also the level that our people need to develop
economically and to carve out a place in the wider regional economies in which
Aboriginal people are located.
Regional organisation is still under-developed. We have been working in Cape York for the past 10 years, putting together the foundations of regional governance and self determination. We now have:
(the) Peninsula ATSIC Regional Council
Tharpuntoo Aboriginal Legal Service
Cape York Land Council
Apunipima Cape York Health Council
(and) Balkanu Cape York Development Corporation
And
we also now have Cape York Partnerships as an interface for partnerships with
government and external non-government sectors.
We have endeavoured to develop unity, common purpose and vision for the
future of Cape York. To develop
plans and strategies – and to work together towards their achievement.
It has been and it is still – hard work.
But we believe that getting organised regionally is a necessary part of
development of our people at the local level.
If we don’t get organised regionally, we can’t represent the local
level in the ways that are needed in order to deal with governments and the
outside world.
In
developing ourselves at the regional level in Cape York, we are also conscious
that if a national agreement in the form of a Treaty is to be reached – agreements
at the regional level will be necessary.
In
fact any future treaty is likely to set a framework and general principles –
whilst the agreements of substance are negotiated and settled at the regional
level. The concept of regional
agreements – which has disappeared from discussion in this country in recent
years – are probably going to be the only way treaties can be implemented in
practice.
How do we get 80-90% of
the country to support a treaty?
The
big question that we have to start focusing on is this: how do we get 80-90% of
the country to support a treaty?
My
Cape York colleague, Noel Pearson, explains the difference between what he calls
51% and 80-90% strategies.
51%
strategies are strategies that we use when we need:
·
the Government of the day to make some policy or administrative decision
that we want, or
·
we need the Government of the day to get legislation passed by the
Commonwealth Parliament
It
means we only need to convince one side of politics (usually the Left
side of politics) to champion a particular issue – and as long as they carry
51% of the country behind them, we can get executive or legislative victories.
When
we pursue 51% strategies, our main challenge is to convince those who are in
power to do the right thing. It
doesn’t matter if the other Right side of politics goes against us – as long
as the Left have 51%, we can get a result.
But
of course convincing the Left, when it is in power, is not an easy thing.
They are always afraid that if they agree to what we want, they will go
from 51% to 49% at the next election.
This is how Noel Pearson generalises the different political constituencies in Australia.
[SHOW
SLIDE]
Anyway,
Noel’s point is that 51% strategies are clockwise strategies.
It starts from the Left and moves to the right.
But,
51% strategies won’t work if we are talking about a treaty and
constitutional change. As we have
already discussed, if we want to change the Australian Constitution we need “a
majority of voters in a majority of the states”. That is, we need an 80-90% strategy.
We
in Cape York are of the view that 80-90% strategies are fundamentally
different from 51% strategies. Let
me make four points about the differences:
·
Firstly, if you want 80-90% of the electorate to support our cause, we
have to work counter clockwise – from the Right to the Left.
We have to convince the people on the furthest Right that we can.
In other words, we have to convince the National Party’s regional and
conservative constituency. If we
can convince these people to treat with us, then everybody else to the Left of
them should fall into position.
·
Secondly, the people on the furthest Right must be made the primary
owners and the primary advocates of a treaty deal with our people.
It is only by them making the deal and playing the leading role in such a
reconciliation, that they will then champion the treaty.
If the treaty is owned as an issue and championed by the Left, we will
get nowhere with the Right.
·
Thirdly, the more we push the treaty through 51% strategies – that is,
as a movement starting from the Left and moving rightwards – the greater the
likelihood that the Right will oppose it, and we will never build the 80-90%
constituency we need to get constitutional change.
The Bridge Walkers, the Reconciliation Movement and so on – these are
51% strategies.
·
Fourthly, we get nowhere if we spend all of our energy and time by
preaching to the converted (or to the people who are easy to convert).
Never mind this mob – they’re the easy ones.
Let’s now think hard about how we’re gonna swing the hard nuts.
So
the big political questions facing those who advocate a Treaty are these: is it
at all imaginable that we could find common ground with conservative and
regional Australia such that they would support a Treaty? In what conditions could this scenario come about?
What would we need to do to locate this common ground?
These
are not easy questions to answer. But
we must turn our minds to them. Because
the reality is this: if we can’t find common ground with the National Party
and its conservative and regional constituency – then we can’t get a Treaty
in the form of constitutional change.
The
treaty must start in the bush and then move to the cities.
If we develop the treaty in the cities and try to take it out into the
bush – the bush will kill it.
What is involved in moving
towards a Treaty?
Let
me very briefly summarise the ingredients necessary to bring a Treaty into
existence.
·
5% involves legal and political theory.
This is what we are doing at this Conference. This is what we have been doing at all of the other
conferences and seminars on the subject of the treaty.
We have not made much progress with the theory, because our thinking
about the details is still largely stunted.
Mick Dodson’s speech to the Mabo Conference in Townsville last year is
the one exception.
The point that we from Cape York want to make about the theory is this: theory is important, but let’s understand that it is only a small part of what is needed to get a Treaty.
·
5% involves developing and deciding on the
constitutional mechanism.
This is very, very important. But
it is also the easy part and is only 5% of our challenge.
·
90% of the challenge involves political
strategy and prosecution of the strategy.
This is the hard work. This
is about lining all of the planets up. This
is about herding a million feral cats dispersed throughout bushlands all over
the continent. This about lining up
all of the thousands of ducks in the Kakadu wetlands into one orderly line. This is the truly hard business.
In
conclusion, let me say that it is our belief from Cape York Peninsula that the
achievement of a treaty between the Indigenous Peoples of Australia and the
Commonwealth on behalf of the Non-Indigenous Peoples of Australia – is a
conceivable reality. It is within
the realms of possibility.
But
if a Treaty is to be reached, then there will need to be leadership and unity
amongst the Indigenous peoples of Australia.
If we are united and we recognise and support our leadership – then I
have no doubt we could get there. We
have the people. We have the
opportunities. In fact, it is
probably true that there has never been a better time for us to move to a
Treaty, than now. Will we have
the unity and will we be clever enough to recognise the opportunity and make the
plans and strategies so that we can reach the Holy Grail?
ENDS