For half an hour on Monday, Victoria’s opposition leader, John Pesutto, tied himself in knots attempting to explain why the Coalition was walking back its support for a state treaty with First Nations people.
With a pained expression on his face, Pesutto began the press conference with hand-wringing about the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Victorians.
He said Indigenous incarceration rates increased by 5.5% in Victoria in the last year alone, while the rate at which young Indigenous Victorians were in out-of-home care was twice the national average. One-third of young Indigenous Victorians don’t finish year 12, he said.
Pesutto then raised vague concerns about government “secrecy” and the state’s cultural heritage laws, which he claims have delayed the roll-out of new housing stock. (No mention of the soaring costs for materials or labour shortages).
He also had another concern – the divisive nature of the debate during last year’s Indigenous voice to parliament referendum.
“I don’t want Victorians to have to go through that again,” Pesutto said, adding that Victoria must find a way to close the gap “in a way which unifies us as a people”.
All this before he said outright that the opposition would no longer be supporting treaty.
“I respect the views of others who think that treaty is the best way to go but I just want to be upfront with the Victorian people that I don’t believe that’s the right way to go,” Pesutto eventually said.
But by the end of it, he had failed to provide an alternative solution to any of the issues he raised, beyond “investing” in education, child protection and criminal justice.
“Isn’t that what governments – Liberal and Labor – have been doing for the last 30, 40, 50 years?” a reporter asked.
‘Disappointing but not surprising’
Monday’s press conference was a far cry from the comments made by the opposition’s spokesperson for Aboriginal affairs, Peter Walsh, in parliament in 2022, when he spoke in support of a bill establishing a Treaty Authority.
But on Sunday, he told Sky News “things have changed”. On Monday, he questioned the need for a treaty during an interview on ABC Radio Melbourne.
“Lots of people would say ‘How can you have a treaty with yourself?’ Because we are all Australians,” Walsh said.
In the same interview, he said the decision had been made in spring, after the referendum result.
So why was the policy change revealed during a Sky News interview less than a week away from Australia Day, which is also referred to as Invasion Day and considered a day of mourning by many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people?
Pesutto provided the excuse that he and Walsh wanted to speak with “key stakeholders” before announcing the new position. But several Indigenous leaders and members of Victoria’s First Peoples’ Assembly said on Monday they had been blind-sided.
Two sources close to the assembly said that at a meeting in November, Walsh raised cultural heritage concerns but never suggested the issue would mean a change in position on treaty.
In a statement issued on Sunday, the assembly said the Coalition’s decision was “disappointing, but not surprising”.
In the wake of the referendum, the Liberal National party in Queensland withdrew bipartisan support for a treaty process and the New South Wales Labor government said it was assessing its next steps.
‘No one has any idea why we don’t support treaty’
Several Liberal MPs told Guardian Australia they were also “completely blind-sided” by the announcement and disappointed by Pesutto’s press conference performance.
“Why on earth would you get the leader of another political party to make the announcement, months after we’ve made the decision, and then seek to make it out like it’s about culture heritage issues when it isn’t,” one Liberal MP said.
“Somehow you’ve managed to offend absolutely every one with a decision that should have been a no-brainer. It was an abject failure of leadership on every front.”
One MP described the attempt to conflate the new position on treaty with cultural heritage issues as “messy”.
“It just confuses our message,” they said. “A key problem is people don’t know what we stand for. We could’ve made a stand on this front but now no one has any idea why we don’t support treaty.”
The MP said it was their understanding the decision was based on the referendum result and the recommendations from the Yoorrook Justice Commissionwhich called for an overhaul of the state’s criminal justice and child protection systems.
They ranged from urgent issues like raising the age of criminal responsibility to 14 to huge, long-terms reforms – such as establishing a dedicated child protection system for First Nations’ children run by First Nations’ people. The latter, the commission said, could form part of treaty negotiations.
“That freaked a lot of people in our camp out,” another MP said. “Even those with a more progressive bent.”
Indeed, during Monday’s press conference, Pesutto attempted to conflate the commission’s recommendations with treaty, suggesting the premier had already “agreed” to “two systems of law”, “two child protection systems” and “reparations”. He later repeated the comments on 3AW Radio.
But Jacinta Allan has done no such thing. The government is yet to respond to the commission’s recommendations, with a spokesperson on Monday saying they are still being considered.
A senior Labor source said it was “highly unlikely” all recommendations will be adopted, noting the government had already ruled out immediately raising the age of criminal responsibility to 14.
When this was put to Pesutto at Monday’s press conference, he said the government should be “upfront about what’s on the table”.
But again – no one is at the negotiating table just yet. The only thing that has been agreed upon – and was done so with bipartisan support – is the framework for negotiations.
Some issues may take years to settle, while any major structural reform would need to pass parliament. Unless the changes require a constitutional change, the government would likely have the numbers it needs to pass treaty without the Coalition.
Perhaps Greens leader, Samantha Ratnam, put it best when she said the opposition’s decision to drop their support for treaty now – before we even know what it looks like – will render them “irrelevant”.
