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Chapter 1: What does Victoria's treaty mean for Indigenous communities?
This is part two of a two-part episode that we're bringing you, recorded back in September of 2025, just after Victoria introduced a bill that would give effect to Australia's first ever treaty with First Nations people.
Indigenous leaders across the country have welcomed Victoria's first treaty. The legislation will enshrine a democratically elected body for First Peoples called Gellingwall that will be consulted on laws and policies affecting Indigenous communities. And now there are calls for other states and territories to use the Victorian example as a model to establish their own treaties.
But there's also, predictably, pushback, with critics calling it costly and divisive in claims that echo the voice debate. And state and territory leaders across the country are walking away from previous promises and commitments.
Today, Ryder and 7am co-host Daniel James, who was also one of the authors of the Europe Commission reports, on whether Victoria's treaty marks a turning point or an anomaly. Daniel, Australia's first treaty was introduced into Parliament this week in Victoria.
Chapter 2: How has the Victorian treaty been received nationally?
How significant is this moment?
Well, it's the only time in the history of the entire country that a treaty has been introduced into a state or federal parliament. It's been on the back of decades of work, but in a formal sense, in terms of the actual process of getting this treaty to this point, it's been at least six years. It has survived two elections.
Chapter 3: What criticisms have emerged regarding the treaty legislation?
It has gone through a pandemic. It has gone through a very divisive referendum. But despite all that, the First People's Assembly in its two iterations have gotten us to this point, and it was a remarkable day for everyone that has either paid close interest to this or been involved in it.
It didn't take long, though, for criticism to appear in some media outlets. This treaty legislation is a slap in the face to the majority of Victorians who less than two years ago voted no to Labor's voice to Parliament, isn't it? On Sky, we heard people start to say that the Victorian government is, quote, pandering to a minority.
And as usual, Victoria is way out in front in another example of pandering to a minority in favour of the majority. Singling out in particular things like the changes to the curriculum that will be introduced and changes to place names.
Chapter 4: Why is this treaty considered a significant historical moment?
Have a look at this. Barry Yip Primary. Now, you say it apparently Bar-ray-ip. Now, you've got Cuyim Primary in Pakenham. It's pronounced Cuyim. You've got Mini-yan in... Did you expect that kind of commentary?
Yeah, it's sadly predictable because it's pretty much all they've really got in their kit in terms of being able to attack processes like this. They are ostensibly a bunch of one-trick ponies. When it comes to the idea of the First Nations people here being a minority, yes, we are a minority. But we are a minority that were here for 60,000 years.
Chapter 5: What are the implications of the treaty for other states and territories?
And when colonialism came here, were a minority that had our land stolen, our waterways desecrated. We were the result of policies of eradication, both formal and informal. We were the victims of massacres, we were the victims of disease and alcohol that was brought here. The tremendous wealth that was created in this place through things like the gold rush,
Aboriginal people never saw, even though it was the plundering of their land that resulted in that. The billions of dollars that have been generated through our waterways and land and skies, we've never seen a cent of. We were deprived of our rights. And so, yes, we are a minority, but we also are the first peoples of this place.
And this treaty and the truth-telling process you looked before it is a reckoning of that, and it shows a state that is mature enough and bold enough to be able to deal with these particular issues in a mature and forensic, but also incredibly nuanced way.
And so the response from sections of the media was entirely predictable, trying to conflate it with things like the referendum, which is a completely different thing.
Chapter 6: How could political changes affect the treaty's future?
This is it. This is what's happening. And if people want to conflate that with the referendum result for political purposes, then we'll wave to them as we go over the hill and down the road.
We even heard some voices saying that this treaty should be put to a state referendum, much like the voice. What this shows is that the elites in this society don't care what you think. They don't care how you vote. They've got their own ideology and they are going to implement it anyway. You don't hear those types of comments about legislation in other areas of Australian politics.
So why do you think that Indigenous policy draws that kind of reaction?
Because I think that people conflate the referendum result with actual political mileage and gain to be had at the expense of First Nations people. It's only with blackfellas that we're asked to have referendums, to put it to the vote. Well, this thing has survived two state elections, which was a key platform for the...
Chapter 7: What changes can we expect in the Victorian education system due to the treaty?
Andrew's Labor government and did have bipartisan support from the national and liberal parties before they chickened out of it and saw an opportunity after the referendum to try and gain some sort of political capital out of it. But I think the last referendum we had in Victoria was around daylight saving. So that's the kind of referendums we have at the state level here in Victoria.
Why would we have a referendum on this? And anyone saying that the government is planning to have a referendum to enshrine this in the constitution of the state is just either mistaken or they are lying for political gain or for clickbait.
And during the voice debate, the Prime Minister, he avoided talking about a national treaty. He said this is something that's happening at the state and territory level. Victoria is now the first.
Chapter 8: How does the treaty impact the relationship between First Nations and the broader community?
But what are we seeing in regards to other states and territories?
In terms of the treaty process, Victoria is years and years ahead of what's happening in other states and territories.
We've seen attacks on treaty processes and truth-telling processes across the country, probably most brutally in Queensland, in which there was a truth-telling process that was established but was torn down, I think, on the second day of the Christopher Lee government in Queensland being in power.
The Prime Minister was warned on multiple occasions in the last six months that if he continued down this path, this is what would occur. This is the kind of division that would occur. Well, I'm not going to make the same mistake as the Prime Minister.
The Albanese government spent a tremendous amount of political capital in its first term on the referendum. They haven't been wanting to go near Aboriginal affairs in a truth-telling or treaty sense since then.
But I do note that the Minister for Indigenous Australians, Melindiri McCarthy, has been in Victoria this week, and she is making more and more solid sort of pronouncements around a national truth-telling process. which is encouraging because there is a void at the national level. It's a case of Victoria going out on its own and trying to improve outcomes for people here.
But what we've done by going through that process is showing to the rest of the country that this can be done. And it can be done in a way that is inclusive and in a way that is looking more to the future now than to the past. We have, through the truth-telling process here, reckoned with our past. We have now got our eyes firmly set on the future and that is what treaty is about.
And that is something that can be replicated at the national level if the government chooses to do so.
Coming up, could the years of work in getting to this moment all be undone? You mentioned Queensland where the treaty process was axed after there was a change in government. So is there a risk that if in Victoria, if Labor loses office, that the treaty could be undone, especially given that the Liberal Party in Victoria is against it?
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