THE HON TANYA PLIBERSEK MP
MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND WATER
FEDERAL MEMBER FOR SYDNEY
DOORSTOP
REDFERN, SYDNEY
SATURDAY, 14 OCTOBER 2023
SUBJECTS: VOICE TO PARLIAMENT.
TANYA PLIBERSEK, MINISTER FOR ENVIRONMENT AND WATER, MEMBER FOR SYDNEY: Today is an historic day. Today is our opportunity to say yes to reconciliation, yes to listening, and yes to better results. We know that this has been a terrific opportunity for Australians to walk forward together. And my message today to anybody who is still undecided is please take this opportunity to walk forward together as a united Australia to voter yes. To vote yes to recognition, yes to listening, yes to better results.
We’ve got Thomas Mayo here who has just been an extraordinary campaigner for the voice and for constitutional recognition. He’s been all over the country working hard, not just in recent months, but for years now. Thomas do you want to say a few words?
THOMAS MAYO: It’s a really exciting day. I’m really excited, there’s been so much hard work that’s been done - decades of hard work by our elders and now here we are with this opportunity for Australians to say yes simply to recognise Indigenous people in our constitution, that should’ve always been the case, and to give us a voice. Give us an advisory committee so we can speak to the matters that affect us, so that we can improve outcomes, so that we can end entrenched disadvantage. This is a moment where we are going to celebrate, our children will be proud of us if we vote yes. And I’ve just got this message this morning to all of the Australian people thats are listening at your homes or if you’re watching this on your device, please make the effort to get out there and vote. Please look through the noise, see what the truth of this is - that it’s an advisory committee, it’s a form of recognition that a majority of Indigenous people have invited you to say yes to. So go and vote, and be proud of this country and make us a better, more united and reconciled nation.
JOURNALIST: What kind of Australia are you hoping to wake up to tomorrow?
MAYO: I hope that we wake up to see an Australia that is more united, that is stronger because we have come together with our ancient culture. The old with the new, that will make us stronger. It will make us more reconciled, it will make us more truthful about our history, and it will give us the best opportunity that we have to end entrenched disadvantage for our children and to see all Australians have a better life. All future generations, together.
JOURNALIST: And what would a No mean for Australia?
MAYO: There’s a great contrast between Yes or No here. Yes makes it possible to end that entrenched disadvantage for our children, where as No means more of the same. We know that everything is failing to date. It doesn’t matter who you voted for in the past, they’ve failed us. This year, in 2023, the gap has widened. This is our one opportunity in our lifetime to make that systemic change that we know that governments when they’re not in a referendum campaign and they’re not electioneering, when they’re not trying to take bark off each other, they agree that this is the best path forward. So this is our best opportunity, and I really hope to see Australia celebrate that we got it right.
JOURNALIST: Tanya, a lot of vocal Yes campaigners here today. Is this an emotional moment for you?
MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I feel really emotional about this because, as Thomas says, this is our one opportunity in my lifetime to change our constitution. You know, our constitution was written at a time when people thought that this was an empty land, that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples were dying out. We know that the exact opposite is true. We have strong, resilient First Nations people in Australia, with 65,000 years of history and culture. We should be celebrating that, that is unique in the world and we should be celebrating that. And the constitution, the document from which all our laws spring, should acknowledge that. More particularly, one of the things I feel so optimistic about is you see people here who are voting - we’ve got young people, old people, we’ve got people from all different background who have come out together today in a unified way to say we want something better for our nation, we want a better future. We know that there is - this is a great country, this is a wonderful country, but the people who have been here longest suffer institutional disadvantage. We’ve got a life expectancy gap, we’ve got an education gap, we’ve got an employment gap, we’ve got a health gap. We need to close that gap and what we’ve tried to date hasn’t worked. Successive governments, this is not something that has come up in the last six months, successive governments have asked First Nations Australians ‘how do we close the gap?’, ‘what sort of constitutional recognition do you want?’ This started with John Howard, this something that people have been working on for years and years, and this is our opportunity to close that gap by setting up an advisory body to give advice to the parliament and by recognising First Nations people in our constitution. It’s a very simple request, and in our community I think it’s been a unifying request. It shows how we can move forward together as a nation.
JOURNALIST: Support for yes has been going backwards, if you believe the polls it’s looking like a pretty comprehensive no. Do you have any regrets about the campaign?
PLIBERSEK: I’m going to be working every single minute of today until the polling booths close to do my very best for a yes vote. That’s all I’m focused on today. That is 100 per cent my focus.
JOURNALIST: Do you accept a failure of this referendum is a failure of your government?
MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I’m not going to contemplate that because we’ve still got hours to go and I know there are millions of undecided Australians. That’s my focus, speaking to those undecided Australians and saying this is our opportunity for a unifying moment for this country. This is our opportunity to say yes to recognition, yes to listening, and yes to better results. We’ve got to take the opportunity today to vote yes.
MAYO: I think it should be noted the courage of the Government to take this to the people, but not just the courage of the Government but the courage of people from across the political spectrum. We’ve got Julian Leeser in the Liberals, we’ve got Andrew Gee former Nationals, we see Julie Bishop walking alongside Penny Wong, and so this is something that is beyond politics. And I ask people to put their political affiliations aside today, look at what this is about - simply recognising Indigenous people in the constitution and giving us a say, a fair go, an advisory committee. Australians have nothing to lose but everything to gain from saying Yes. We can do this together as Australians.
AUNTY NORMA INGRAM: We are two local Aboriginal elders in the community, Aunty Beryl and Aunty Norma, and we have been fighting against all the disadvantage for years and years and years. As a matter of fact, in 1938 my parents and their children were fighting to be recognised as citizens of this country. The fight continues. We want that fight to stop today by getting a yes vote for our children, for our grandchildren, for our future. That’s all we can contemplate today. Vote yes, because it’s important to us, and it will be good for us and it will be good for Australia.
AUNTY BERYL VAN-OPLOO: I just want to say if you have a voice, you have a choice. So vote yes.
END
