Tony Nutt, a former federal director of the Liberal Party and chief-of-staff to John Howard, also rubbished opponents’ depictions of the proposed advisory body as a “Canberra Voice”.
A Liberal Party elder has taken aim at “bunkum” pushed by the No campaign about the Indigenous Voice to Parliament, including its pejorative description of a “Canberra voice” and its demands for more details on how the advisory body would operate.
“It might be that I have a deep concern about the colour on the button of the Victorian military establishment artillery unit. They didn’t go into all of that because they knew ... if you agreed with the constitution, you adopted it. That sets the framework and the principles. Then the parliament breathes life into the institutions because that’s what the parliament does.
Nutt said members of the Voice would be chosen by local Indigenous people, not the government. Nor would it be compulsorily constituted by academics - “obviously the new criminal bikie gang leaders of Australian politics”.“They’ll go to Canberra,” he said. “The Canberra that actually exists, not the mythical Canberra [where] the roads are paved with gold and the public servants are all at lunch, and lunch goes from about 10.30 to about 16.30.
He also rubbished suggestions the Voice would be dictating or influencing policy on matters such as foreign affairs. Asked about Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s role in prosecuting some of those arguments against the Voice, Nutt said he was not interested in commenting on personalities or political tactics.
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