Jacinta Price reveals the reasons why she’s not supporting the voice to parliament as an Aboriginal woman

Indigenous Australian Opposition Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has outlined the reasons she will vote no in the Voice to Parliament referendum.

The Coalition senator said an advisory body was a “step backwards” and would create a “wall between Australians” in a short opinion piece published by News Corp.

“As more people tune into the debate, it is clear that they understand the importance of the change they have been asked to consider and that they have questions,” she said. writing.

“The one I get most often: ‘Why are you, an Indigenous woman, opposing Voice?’ The answer is simple, it is the Voice of Division.

The Coalition senator said an advisory body was a “step backwards” and would create a “wall between Australians” in a short opinion piece published by News Corp.

Senator Price said Australia had spent 122 years trying to break down barriers between races and encourage greater understanding of Aboriginal Australians.

She said the Voice would not promote recognition or reconciliation because it was an “invitation only process every step of the way”.

“A movement of academics, activists and elites who think they know best. Trust us, they say, we will do it right and give you the details later,” she wrote.

Senator Price said The Voice defenders had “stubbornly” called for the creation of an advisory body to Parliament despite refusals from legal experts.

She claimed that these experts had been subjected to “insults” and “abuse” for disagreeing with the principles of The Voice.

“When Yes campaigners realized they couldn’t win on the merits or on their proposition, they turned to emotional blackmail,” she wrote.

“They make promises they know they can’t keep.”

Senator Price then turned her attention to the Yes campaigners – who she said were dismissing the arguments against the vote as “racist and stupid”.

Professor Marcia Langton described Australia as a “horrible, racist country” in a 2017 audio.

Senator Price said Anthony Albanese’s voice in Parliament was being used as a mechanism to undermine the last 122 years of work to bring Australians together.

She used the example of Yes advocate Professor Marcia Langton, who called Australia a “horrible, racist country” in an audio recording that resurfaced last week.

“What fantasy world do they live in that makes them wonder?” » we hear the architect of Voice say in the clip.

“Of course Australia is racist. It’s a horrible, racist country.

Senator Price said the Voice was being used as a mechanism to undermine the last 122 years of work to bring Australians together.

“For them, this Voice is not an attempt to unify, but a tool to divide,” she wrote, adding that she did not want her own family or country to be divided.

“My mother’s name is Warlpiri, my father is of Irish descent and all three of us are Australian. I want us to be one, together and not two divided,” she wrote.

“That’s why I’m voting no to the Voice of Division.”

It comes after Professor Langton called Senator Price’s supporters “crazy racists” in an article she wrote for the Saturday Paper in 2018.

Senator Price said Yes campaigners rejected arguments against The Voice as “racist and stupid” and that legal experts faced “abuse” for disagreeing with its principles.

The Yes campaigner also took aim at the politician’s mother, Bess, who she said had a “repulsion” for her own culture.

“Jacinta Price is useful to politicians,” Professor Langton wrote.

“She legitimizes racist views by expressing them against her own people.

“When she walks around Alice Springs and Tennant Creek with the Prime Minister, she is waving a flag for the increasingly normal racial politics coming out of Canberra.

“The damage it causes to Indigenous people in the Northern Territory is well known.”

Last week, Senator Price said colonization had had no lasting negative impact on Aboriginal Australians during a speech to the National Press Club in Canberra.

Senator Price replied “I’ll be honest, no” when asked if the situation of indigenous people had been worse because of British colonization.

“A positive impact? Absolutely. I mean, now we have running water, we have food readily available,” she said.

“Many of us have the same opportunities as every other Australian in this country.

“We certainly have one of the best systems in the world in terms of democratic structure compared to other countries – that’s why migrants are flocking to Australia.”

Mr Albanese is pictured with Noel Pearson at a Yes campaign event last week

Australia’s Indigenous Affairs Minister Linda Burney slammed the claims, saying she was shocked by the remarks which were “simply untrue”.

“They are offensive and a real betrayal of the many families who have experienced things like the Stolen Generations,” the minister said.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton supported Senator Price, despite his failure to support a policy of coalition of local and regional Indigenous voices.

Mr Dutton has previously said he would support regional “Indigenous Voice”-style bodies rather than a national model.

He said people should listen to Ms Price and not “other people’s views about the capital”, saying her comments were drawn from her experience living in Alice Springs.

“She was courageous, willing to stand up for what she believes in and believes passionately in creating a better society for Indigenous Australians,” he told Nine’s Today Show last week.

During the same interview, Mr Dutton returned to his previous calls for a second referendum on constitutional recognition of indigenous peoples, should the next vote fail.