There is a part of Berg, even when he was haggling with government officials over the final wording of the agreement, who doubted whether Victoria, or indeed any Australian state, would ever take this step. He now feels an overwhelming sense of responsibility to make sure that all the well-intentioned commitments within the agreement add up to meaningful change for Aboriginal lives.
“It is now going to happen,” he says. “We have got to get to the work of making sure it is going to be effective and efficient as possible, that it is actually going to deliver on what it is supposed to do.”
On this, Gallagher firmly agrees. “If we can demonstrate that it does make a difference, it does work and it was the right thing to do, I think all of Australia will be a better place,” she says.
Aunty Jill Gallagher described the realisation of treaty as surreal.Credit: Jason South
This is the shift we need to get our heads around. Treaty is not a proposed policy or an election promise, it is done.
When debate on the legislation resumes in the state parliament later this month, there will be plenty said but no substantive changes to the governance structure it will establish, known as Gellung Warl, to give Aboriginal people more say over government policies that affect them and their own affairs.
It is a fundamental reset of rights and responsibilities. Greater self-determination for Aboriginal people also means greater Aboriginal ownership of problems – disproportionately higher jobless rates, infant mortality rates, suicide rates, incarceration rates and children in out-of-home care – which have frustrated governments for years.
Not all Aboriginal people are welcoming this change.
Nyunggai Warren Mundine told the Herald Sun that treaty was “probably the worst nightmare our parliamentary system has been hit with” and a referendum was needed to decide the matter. Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price said Gellung Warl was being imposed on Victorians without consultation or consent.
Mundine and Price were highly influential in the campaign against the Voice referendum, but they don’t speak for mob in Victoria.
A defining characteristic of Victoria’s treaty is that it does not impinge upon parliament’s sovereign power to make laws or the government’s capacity to govern. On this, the legislation is explicit.
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Kevin Bell, a former Supreme Court judge who served on the Yoorrook Justice Commission, says that instead of requiring change to the Constitution, Gellung Warl draws on established processes and mechanisms within Victoria’s democratic framework.
“We can hold in our mind two ideas – that consultation and participation by First Peoples needs to be significantly increased and that should be done whilst protecting constitutional principles we hold dear,” Bell says.
If, as a Victorian voter, you feel ambushed by treaty, you haven’t been paying attention.
The Andrews government first announced in March 2016 that it was working towards greater self-determination for Aboriginal people and treaty.
It passed legislation in 2018 to advance the treaty process and in 2022 to establish a treaty authority. The First Peoples’ Assembly was created to negotiate treaty and the Yoorrook Justice Commission to inform it. Formal negotiations began last November.
The Victorian government, having promised treaty, was re-elected in 2018 and again in 2022. Treaty was bipartisan policy in Victoria until the referendum result prompted the opposition to withdraw its support at the start of last year.
Treaty will be decried as a Victorian Voice, a third chamber of parliament and a threat to our democracy. It is none of these things. But it is here. That in itself, is quite a thing.
Chip Le Grand is state political editor.
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