Nick G.
A bit over a year ago the federal Government appointed an Expert Panel to advise on the terms for a referendum to change the Australian Constitution to provide recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.
On one level, the move was a welcome admission that the Constitution has shortcomings and omissions in respect of the dispossession by British colonialism of the inhabitants of the continent. If it is possible win acceptance for an amendment to right this injustice, then that is also welcome.
However, there are problems with the process for achieving this, problems with the appropriateness of the Constitution as document that serves the needs of the people of Australia, and problems arising from the failure to sign a Treaty with ATSI peoples and the failure to introduce a Bill of Rights within the Constitution.
Process out of touch with communities
The majority of the members of the Expert Panel live in a world removed from ATSI communities regardless of whether these are urban or remote. Members drawn from the corporate, legal and academic worlds are not representative of most ATSI communities. This ensures that the process is in the control of a class that most ATSI people cannot aspire to. The panel has held “consultations” with communities but these are mere window-dressing.
ATSI persons comprise a small majority of the 14-person panel, but men outnumber women 10-4. Not only are communities under-represented, but women who provide so much of the strength and leadership within those communities are also under-represented.
Constitution created by and for imperialism
E.F. Hill, founding Chair of the CPA (M-L), had this to say of the Australian Constitution:
The constitution itself was a compromise between the British imperialists, the new central authority and the authority of the previous six separate colonies (now States). It was characterized firstly by its absolute exclusion of Australia’s native black people (i.e. it assumed the complete correctness of seizure of Australia from the black people and their ruthless extermination)…It was a fairly weak federation. Its weakness was born of the vested imperial interests in the six separate colonies (States) which were reluctant to hand over authority to an unknown and untried central authority, and in the efforts of the British imperialists to maintain a direct hold on Australia.
Hill identified the basic problem with the Constitution - that it was created by and for imperialism. All of its flaws – beginning with its refusal to even acknowledge the existence of ATSI peoples –stem from it as a creation of imperialism designed to further the hold that finance capitalism (that form of capitalism that distinguishes old-style colonialism from the imperialist era) has on our country.
Way forward – Treaty and a republican constitution
The work of the expert panel may well be nothing more than a ploy to avoid the responsibility of a negotiated Treaty.
A Treaty is a formal recognition of an historical antagonism and conflict in which violence or the threat of force and violence has been a defining influence. A Treaty is required to do justice to the nature of ATSI people’s dispossession by British colonialism. A Treaty is required to acknowledge continuing custodianship of country by ATSI communities.
Part of the Treaty process will be to respect the differing circumstances of various ATSI communities. Some ATSI leaders favour a single national Treaty; others seek Treaties with particular communities.
Simply recognising Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander prior occupation of Australia carries with it the danger of reinforcing the dispossession. (“Yes, they were the ‘original occupants’ but that ceased in 1788”). Continuing sovereignty over country where that exists must be recognised, but most observers have noted that while “there was a strong push for Aboriginal sovereignty to be recognised, (the panel) considered it too hard”.
A growing number of ATSI leaders are saying that the expert panel’s recommendations are a failure precisely because they ignore the “central and substantive issue of sovereignty and land rights.”
The existing Constitution, even with amendments that recognise prior ATSI occupation of Australia, can never serve the needs of an independent Australia.
A republican constitution, based on a Treaty between the Australian Government and ATSI peoples, proclaiming Australia as an independent, sovereign and democratic nation, and incorporating a Bill of Rights is required.
This will be achieved when we win genuine national independence from imperialism, and end the capitalist system with its right to rule vested in the handful of the rich and powerful under the protection of bourgeois law.
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