Anthony Albanese walks away from Makarrata commission pledge

[Pelican Press 0]

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Anthony Albanese walks away from Makarrata commission pledge

Anthony Albanese has walked away from a national body to oversee agreement-making between Indigeneous people and governments but insists he is still committed to truth-telling and working with First Nations leaders.

The Prime Minister attended the Garma festival in Arnhem land over the weekend and promised a new focus on economic development for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

He used his first speech at the festival as leader in 2022 to propose a wording for the constitutional change and last year’s appearance to reignite the Voice referendum campaign.

The Uluru Statement from the Heart, which Mr Albanese promised at the election to implement in full, calls for a Makarrata commission to oversee truth-telling and a process of agreement-making between governments and communities.

However, in an interview on Sunday, Mr Albanese indicated the Government was unlikely to go ahead with the commission as it works out how to retool its Indigenous policies after the referendum loss.

He said calls for a truth and justice-style commission were not what his Government had proposed.

“What we’ve proposed is Makarrata just being the idea of coming together. That’s what we want to do,” Mr Albanese told the ABC’s Insiders.

“Ongoing engagement is what we do, a coming together. Now that might take forms as it evolves.

“What it means is listening to and respecting First Nations people and then responding.”

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, who is Perth and not attending the Garma festival, said on Friday that if he won government, “there will be no Makarrata and there will be no revisiting of truth-telling”.

Mr Albanese said truth-telling was about acknowledging history and “that why we are here today is because of that history”, including incarcerations rates and economic circumstances.

“I’m not quite sure how Peter Dutton justifies saying he’s against truth-telling, telling the truth about history, or against people coming together in dialogue,” he said.

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