Antinuclear

Treaties can be found in countries such as the US, Canada and New Zealand. Indeed, in nations such as Canada, new treaties are still being made.

Australia is the exception. We are now the only Commonwealth nation that does not have a treaty with its indigenous peoples. We have never entered into negotiations with them about the taking of their lands or their place in this nation. Rather than building our country on the idea of a partnership with Aboriginal people, our laws have sought to exclude and discriminate against them.

This is reflected in the text of our constitution, which in 1901 created the Australian nation. That document was drafted at two conventions held in the 1890s. Aboriginal people were not represented, nor were they consulted in the drafting of the constitution.

Indeed, they were viewed by the drafters as a dying race, and the Australian legal system was premised on the idea that they had no long-term future in the Australian nation.

Until the Mabo case in 1992, this was reflected in the idea that Australia was terra nullius, or no man’s land, when white settlers arrived in 1788. For the purposes of our laws, it was as if Aboriginal people simply did not exist.

So it is no surprise that the constitution was drafted to deny Aboriginal people their rights and their voice, even in their own affairs.

Hence:

•     While the preamble to the constitution set out the history behind the enactment of the constitution and the notion that the constitution was based on the support of the people of the colonies, it made no mention of the prior occupation of Australia by its indigenous peoples. Australia’s history, it seemed, began in 1788.

•     Section 25 recognised that the states could disqualify people from voting in the elections on account of their race.

•     Section 51 (xxvi) provided that the Parliament could legislate with respect to “the people of any race, other than the Aboriginal race in any state, for whom it is deemed necessary to make special laws”. This was the so-called, “races power”, and was inserted, in the words of our first prime minister, Edmund Barton, to allow the Commonwealth to “regulate the affairs of the people of coloured or inferior races who are in the Commonwealth”.

•     Section 127 provided: “In reckoning the numbers of the people of the Commonwealth, or of a state or other part of the Commonwealth, Aboriginal natives shall not be counted”.

Some of these things were fixed with the 1967 referendum. It:

•     Removed the prohibition on the Federal Parliament making laws for Aboriginal people.

•     Deleted the prohibition in section 127 on the counting of Aboriginal peoples.

On the other hand, the referendum did not change the preamble or section 25.

Today, we have a constitution that ignores the existence of Aboriginal people and recognises that people can be denied the vote on account of their race, and that laws can be passed that discriminate against people for the same reason………..

The international evidence is compelling in showing that listening to indigenous people is, by itself, insufficient to bring about real change. Change must be built on the genuine partnership between indigenous people and governments that can arise through the making of a treaty……..

Unlike nations such as New Zealand, Canada and the US, agreements such as treaties have not been reached that recognise a measure of indigenous sovereignty. Instead, in Australia, decisions have often been imposed on Aboriginal people by parliaments and governments lacking even a single indigenous member.

A negotiated treaty with Aboriginal people would mark an important break from a system that for many decades has disregarded the views of Aboriginal people, and reinforced their feelings of powerlessness. A treaty could give rise to stronger, and more capable, institutions of Aboriginal governance………http://www.smh.com.au/comment/treaty-with-australias-indigenous-people-long-overdue-20131112-2xeel.html