Voices of hope

Amid a rising tide of racism and misinformation, Australians are grappling with a simple question that is tearing the country apart.

- ELEANOR DE JONG

The main street of Derby, Western Australia, is bathed in red dust and a faint breeze is stirring the gum trees that dot the edge of this Outback town. Outside the small supermarket, locals gather to shop and exchange gossip in the predominantly Indigenous community of 3000 people. Dogs and small children play on the cracked pavement.

The weekend’s races are dissected, as is the Gibb River Road’s recovery after January’s flood. Crime is talked about – always – plus where the fish are biting. But there is one big topic that’s not on the agenda.

“Have you heard of the Indigenous Voice to Parliament?” I ask locals. “Have you heard of the Voice?” In a crowd of a dozen, only a handful know what I am talking about. When I try to explain it – a referendum to create a federal representative advisory body of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders – people’s eyes glaze over.

“That’s not for us, that’s white fulla business,” says one older man.

In most parts of Australia, certainly the wealthy and city-dominant east coast, the Voice has been the single biggest news story this year. Every day, television and radio broadcasts and newspapers feature multiple angles, and social media is flooded with advertisements from the Yes and No campaigns, as well as an avalanche of fearmongering, conspiracy theories, hate speech and fake news.

But in the bush, and in the remote communities of Indigenous Australia, it is as if the Voice doesn’t exist.