Within a mere 90 minutes of the polls closing, it had become obvious Australians had comprehensively rejected the signature policy of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, known as “The Voice,” designed to give Indigenous Australians a special say in government decision-making from an advisory position.
Endorsing the proposal required a majority of voters in a majority of the states. But it became very clear early on that Australians had rejected the proposal—the national vote and every state failed to reach a majority.
An analysis of the result has some common predictors. The YES vote was strongest the closer you lived to your capital city’s General Post Office (GPO). The further away from the GPO you got, the stronger the NO vote.
It’s a reflection of the inner suburban green left vote, with Greens leader Adam Bandt’s electorate in Melbourne scoring the largest YES vote.
Go figure—the least self-sustaining electorates full of asphalt and concrete vote Green.
Similarly, it seems that the further away you live from Indigenous communities, the more likely the electorate was to vote YES.
The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) also returned a high YES vote. Cost of living, while an issue in the ACT, is largely recession-proof because of the high proportion of public servants whose income is guaranteed, courtesy of the long-suffering taxpayers.
The income bracket of the constituency is also an indicator, where the evening saw well-heeled former Liberal seats—now Teal Independents—voting strongly for the YES campaign. The prime minister’s own seat of Grayndler provided great support for the YES vote.
Two independents who wisely remained neutral on The Voice (Mayo and Fowler) saw their electorates return a solid NO vote.
And spare a thought for the minister responsible for The Voice, Linda Burney, whose electorate also rejected her proposal with some solid NO voting.
YES Campaign Blunders
So what went so horribly wrong to see the NO campaign triumph so resoundingly?The Voice had started strongly in the polls, supported by a conga-line of the “elite” virtue signalling. As sporting and corporate elites siphoned off their members’ and shareholders’ money, providing a $10 to $1 advantage to the YES campaign, along with the blatantly sympathetic media backing of the YES campaign, they might have expected a different result.
Prominent Liberal YES campaigner Julian Leeser saw his own electorate reject his pleas—remember he resigned from the frontbench in protest.
Tasmania, which became the first state in the Federation to register a NO verdict, did so emphatically.
Although the electorate that houses the Hobart GPO voted YES, the northern seat of Bass with prominent Liberal YES member Bridget Archer provided a resounding 60 percent NO vote.
The week before the vote, she was pictured with Mr. Albanese and Liberal Premier Jeremy Rockliff pumping the flesh and promoting the YES campaign with a sycophantic and sympathetic media in tow.
Tasmanians were also subjected to non-stop cartoon coverage, soft media stories, and biased journalism.
And if that wasn’t enough to convince them, a clutch of former Labor and Liberal Premiers came out urging their fellow Tasmanians to vote YES. One even said that the Liberal support for the NO campaign was indicative of how the Liberals were becoming irrelevant.
Business and sporting leaders, along with so-called professional bodies, now need to apologise for their abuse of position and fiduciary duties. They do need to be brought to account.
However, the result on Oct. 14 was similar to the Republic referendum in 1999, where the self-appointed elite completely misread the mood of the Australian people. Will they try again and put the Australian people through another unwanted Republic referendum in a few years’ time?
Tasmania is reflective of the national mood. Cost of living issues are front of mind and The Voice in the latest polling came in at number 17 among issues of concern.
Spending $350 million (US$220 million) plus on a referendum was not an endearing proposition to those struggling to make ends meet—especially when word got out that $39 billion a year is being spent on Indigenous programs.
A Labor government in the past was always focused on the working families, seeking to provide practical solutions to their needs. Today, it lost focus by pursuing an ideological and poorly explained proposition.
The vote was a clear divide between those who live in the large metropolitan areas and cities, and those who live with and in Aboriginal communities in our regional areas, and the “haves” and “have nots.”
The self-appointed elites were well and truly vanquished by quiet Australians who used the ballot box to reject division and say no to racism.
The Marxist authors of The Voice have had another taste of true people power.
