Dear SM,

The voting patterns of the Australian electorate have
shifted. There is more volatility in the Australian
electorate than ever before. As we've seen from recent
results more Australians are swinging between the two
major parties or are voting for third parties with
one in four Australians voting for a minor party.

In the past the political views and opinions of most
voters like their social, geographical and class
location were comparatively much more fixed and stable.
The major parties organised their election platforms
around clearly differentiated, left-right ideological
platforms. By offering two contrasting poles, the major
parties had a powerful tool to attract and connect with
the public. The 21st Century world fundamentally changed
all of that.

Public opinion is now continually shaped and re-shaped by
avalanches of instant-internet-driven information.
Geographical and social mobility means that increasing
numbers of voters no longer identify in a clear way
with the boundaries of socio-economic class and the
ability of our political parties to "represent" is
deteriorating.

Political party membership across the board is at
negligible levels and the percentages will continue to drop
as the world becomes even more fragmented and the
disconnect between voters and parties grows.

That is why sharp poll swings, hung parliaments, and one
term governments will increasingly become the norm.

This was taken from the following website for your
information:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-16/triffitt-vote-compass:-australians-looking-for-direction/7418236

Foxy,

Don't confuse the swing of voters from the two major parties to the plethora of minor parties with more focus positions with the views of voters on individual issues.

The preference of voters for strong border control has been roughly 80% from 2003 to today. KRudd and Juliar both fell foul of this when in 2007 KRudd promised to maintain the Pacific solution and broke this promise to pander to the left whinge of the ALP, and ended up setting up Manus Island and Nauru again after killing 1200+ men women and children as to do otherwise would be electoral suicide.

As far as a treaty is concerned it is a peripheral issue that does not even cross the minds of most Australians, and is talked about only in left whinge circles.

In all the cases where treaties exist, they were negotiated to cease hostilities between the British colonists and the indigenous nations. There have been no hostilities for many years and certainly not since federation, and in 1800 there were no recognisable indigenous nations and certainly none today. Secondly in most cases the separate "nations" fare no better than the Australian indigenous.

Dear Shadow Minister,

Seeing as you claim to read the Sydney Morning Herald
here is an article that hopefully shall inform you:

http://www.smh.com.au/comment/treaty-with-australias-indigenous-people-long-overdue-20131112-2xeel.html

A few quotes:

"Treaties and other forms of agreements are accepted around the
world as the means of reaching a settlement between indigenous
peoples and those who have settled their lands. Treaties can
be found in countries such as the US, Canada, 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 people."

"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 the Aboriginal people, our laws have sought to exclude
and discriminate against them. This is reflected in 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. 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 purpose of our laws it was
as if Aboriginal people simply did not exist..."

The rest of the article is worth a read.

The following link may also help:

http://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/selfdetermination/would-a-treaty-help-aboriginal-self-determination

Dearest Foxy,

I'm so glad that you've come back, after abandoning this thread a couple of times. I won't be so indelicate as to mention Nellie Melba :)

Those quotes from authority: quite a few can of worms there. For example, 'terra nullius' was first mentioned by Justice Blackburn in Milirrpum v. Nabalco, in 1971, perhaps I'm wrong, but he seemed to suggest that people of course were here, but didn't have a system of land proprietorship which was recognised in any body of modern land law. Is that so ?

I've scoured a few tomes on land law and in their history sections - how land proprietorship came about - they skip straight over foraging societies (which usually have their rights to USE the land recognised) - to farming societies.

I'm very uncomfortable about raising the issue but is it possible that foraging societies have a very different perception of their relationship to land compared to farming societies, such as Maori, or many Native American groups ? i.e. in societies which they prepare ground, cultivate, weed, fence in to protect from animals, and harvest crops, either individually or in family groups ?

Yes, I've seen articles about harvesting yams and kangaroo grass, but that's the foraging part of farming: grain farmers are doing right this moment. Foraging societies 'harvest' what nature has provided, farming societies harvest what nature and their labour and capital has provided.

Early farming societies also hunt, gather and fish, so of course they are or were also foragers. The hard question is: are foragers really cultivators ? If not, what is the extent of their proprietorship over land ? I don't like the answer, to be honest. Why couldn't everybody have left 'Mabo' alone, as it was, and gone from there ? This may not end happily.

Love always,

Joe

Dear Joe,

While I appreciate your comments you really should read
the links I gave - especially the one concerning
whether a treaty would help aboriginal self-determination.
I'd be interested to read your views on that particular
subject.

Wishing you love in your heart and joy in all of your days.
Happy New Year!

Foxy,

Of all the reasons for implementing government policy, "Everyone else has one" is the most puerile.

Yes I have read the article and find it at best vague and unsupported. While I support the amendments in the constitution to grant recognition and remove the last vestiges of racism, I find it difficult to see the need for a treaty that would separate indigenous Australians from other Australians and create separate classes of citizens.

Treaties in other countries were created to halt vicious territorial wars and granted indigenous peoples pretty much the same rights as they already have under the Mabo judgement.

Is this just more meaningless left whinge gesture politics. I think so.