Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Education) Share this | Hansard source

What I'm saying is that we have people like a Supreme Court judge sending emails to a member of parliament from a position of extraordinary privilege in our community saying: 'Your position and the position of your party is needlessly cruel and mean-spirited and is patently based upon a political stance that is indecent in its ignorance. May you live long enough to acquire sufficient wisdom and self-awareness to be ashamed of yourself.'

The point I would like to make very simply to people who have a different opinion to the 'yes' campaigners is that it's okay to say no if you have a different view. In my party, we believe in localism. We believe very strongly that the best people to make these decisions on how to overcome local challenges is to work within the structure of national laws and state laws, plus government supports where it's needed, but from our experience centralised decision-making across a range of key issues continues to undermine the success and prosperity of regional communities, including our Indigenous people. The Voice will entrench that disconnect.

It is simply wrong and disrespectful to so many hard-working professionals and community leaders to suggest that nothing positive is occurring across our nation today when it comes to measures to close the gap. From my experience as a minister in veterans affairs and other portfolios, there's always more to be done in every area of public policy, but we should recognise the success stories. I say to those opposite and to those who have painted such a dark picture of our nation: imagine if all the programs from the federal and state governments that are already funded by taxpayers weren't in place today. We have to acknowledge that there are some great initiatives in place. From my experience, the programs that are locally run and directed at local problems tend to have the best outcomes.

It's also incredibly important to keep recognising that Australian voters have already provided a voice in this place for Indigenous people, with the current federal parliament proudly boasting 11 MPs and senators across all political parties—a truly significant achievement. Our political reality in recent years has been that political parties and the Australian voters have recognised the lack of diversity among elected MPs and have taken steps through democratic systems to begin remedying that situation.

In closing, I repeat my earlier comment: it is okay to say no to the Voice. I encourage everyone to treat each other with respect and kindness in this potentially divisive debate. I think Australians are up to the challenge, and I call on the Prime Minister to help reset the tone of the debate. I thank the House.

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