Post by Niemmy on Oct 12, 2007 0:04:05 GMT -5
JOHN Howard has committed a re-elected Coalition government to a referendum to recognise indigenous people in a preamble to the Constitution in pursuit of a new Aboriginal reconciliation based on "equity rather than apologies".
The Prime Minister has overturned more than a decade of opposition to reconciliation involving symbolism, reviving the idea of a constitutional recognition of the achievements and the place of indigenous people in Australia.
"I believe we must find room in our national life to formally recognise the special status of Aboriginal (people) and Torres Strait Islanders as the first peoples of our nation," he said last night.
While refusing to "say sorry" to indigenous Australians or accept any separate treaty, Mr Howard has vowed to use the "watershed change" in national attitudes as a result of the federal intervention in Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory to address a great "challenge and a sorrow".
Anticipating criticism for his previous opposition to apologies and reconciliation, Mr Howard confessed that the issue had been a "struggle" for him but denied he'd undergone a Damascene conversion.
He also accepted the blame for the "dwindling of relationships" between him and Aboriginal leaders, and his failure to fulfil the 1998 election-night promise of reconciliation by 2001.
He said the crisis of indigenous "social and cultural disintegration requires a stronger affirmation of indigenous identity and culture as a source of dignity, self-esteem and pride".
"If re-elected, I will put to the Australian people within 18 months a referendum to formally recognise indigenous Australians in our Constitution - their history as the first inhabitants of our country, their unique heritage of culture and languages, and their special (though not separate) place within a reconciled, indivisible nation.
"My goal is to see a new statement of reconciliation incorporated into the preamble of the Australian Constitution."
The proposal was welcomed by Aboriginal activists, who had been briefed by indigenous leader Noel Pearson before Mr Howard's speech, but many attacked the timing of the announcement as cynical.
"Another bloody election promise," former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission chairwoman Lowitja O'Donoghue said.
"It's not before time, it's what we've fought for, but who believes him? I don't."
Former Labor president and Aboriginal activist Warren Mundine said the announcement was "a bit surprising".
"He has been Prime Minister for 11 years now and he is doing this just days before calling an election. He should go the extra step and say sorry," he said.
Kevin Rudd last night offered bipartisan support for the proposal but said he wanted to see the detail. "Constitutional recognition of indigenous Australians has been long-held federal Labor policy ... A referendum will succeed if it has strong public support, and bipartisan leadership, and in the spirit of the 1967 referendum, federal Labor offers this support."
Mr Howard admitted reconciliation was an area "I have struggled with during the entire time that I have been Prime Minister". He said he felt uncomfortable with the idea of guilt and shame for non-indigenous Australians based "on a repudiation of the Australia I grew up in" and a rights agenda that led to welfare dependency and a sense of separateness. But he said the time was right "to take a permanent, decisive step towards completing some unfinished business of thisnation".
He said the Coalition's intervention in Aboriginal communities to stop domestic violence and sexual attacks on children - "and in particular the public's reaction to it - has been a watershed in indigenous affairs in Australia", overturning "30 years of attitudes and thinking on indigenous policy".
He appealed to Australians to recognise "that while ever our indigenous citizens are left out ormarginalised or feel their identity is challenged, we are alldiminished".
"We are not a federation of tribes," he said. "We are one great tribe; one Australia.
"I sense in the community a rare and unexpected convergence of opinion on this issue between the more conservative approach, which I clearly identify with, and those who traditionally have favoured more of a group rights approach.
"It is a moment in time which should be seized, lest it be lost.
"Now, for the first time in a long time, we can see the outline of a new settlement for indigenous policy in Australia. It stands at a point of intersection between rights and responsibilities; between the symbolic and the practical."
He said it was a "topic of utmost national importance; one that transcends the past, the present and the future of Australia and that goes to the heart of our national identity and shared destiny".
"For my generation - Australians who came of age in the 1950s and 1960s - it has been ever-present; a subject of deep sorrow and of great hope. The challenge, and unfinished business, of our time. It is the place of indigenous people in the profound, compelling and unfolding story of Australia."
Mr Howard has always refused to say "sorry" to the indigenous people taken from their families as children in the 50s and 60s, and has rejected the symbolism of apologies or treaties to achieve reconciliation.
"This new reconciliation I'm talking about starts from the premise that individual rights and national sovereignty prevail over group rights," he said.
"That group rights are, and ought to be, subordinate to both the citizenship rights of the individual and the sovereignty of the nation.
"This is reconciliation based on a new paradigm of positive affirmation, of unified Australian citizenship, and of balance - a balance of rights and responsibilities; a balance of practical and symbolic progress. I'm convinced we are dealing today with a new alignment of ideas and individuals; a coming together of forces I have not witnessed in 32 years of public life.
"At its core is the need for Aboriginal Australia to join the mainstream economy as the foundation of economic and social progress."
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