Mayo urges solidarity for Voice
"Kol Halev" Jewish Voice for Yes campaign is a national initiative founded by Stand Up and the Jewish Community Council of Victoria.
Almost 180 people filled the Sydney Jewish Museum’s (SJM) function hall on July 20 for the NSW launch of the “Kol Halev” Jewish Voice for Yes campaign – a national initiative founded by Stand Up and the Jewish Community Council of Victoria, as the referendum on an Indigenous Voice to Parliament edges closer.
Stand Up CEO Courtney Winter-Peters, when thanking new campaign partners – including the National Council of Jewish Women of Australia, Australasian Union of Jewish Students and Shalom – drew on “our own history, stories and experiences of being voiceless”, in encouraging community advocacy for ‘Yes’.
“We will not be bystanders to systems that have entrenched disadvantage,” she said.
“It is our time to show the First Peoples of this country – the country that has given us a home, safety and a place to thrive – that we see them and we hear them.”
The keynote speaker, Thomas Mayo, was a signatory to the Uluru Statement from the Heart and co-wrote The Voice to Parliament Handbook: All the Detail you Need.
A Darwin resident of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heritage, he revealed his grandfather was a Jewish refugee from Poland.
Addressing claims from the ‘No’ campaign that a ‘Yes’ result would introduce a racial element to the Constitution, and that the proposed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to Parliament would be a third chamber of Parliament, Mayo said the Australian Constitution already has a Race Power section and the Voice will only be an advisory body, on matters relevant to First Nations people.
“It’s not going to spend time talking about submarines and parking tickets – that’s absolute rubbish,” Mayo said.
Providing examples of how previous attempts to establish an Indigenous voice were dismissed in the past, by kings, queens and different governments, Mayo said, “Our voice will be silenced again, if we just set it up in legislation.
“And if you don’t have a voice, you’re not able to defend, as well, against harmful acts against your people.”
Mayo acknowledged that the task to win a referendum – through a majority nationally and in a majority of states – “is extremely difficult and made even more by the stance the Opposition has taken … [but] that doesn’t put me off – it puts fire in my belly”.
“Your friendship and your solidarity is going to be very important,” Mayo said.
Mayo participated in a panel discussion with Ruby Langton-Batty and Shireen Morris, moderated by Associate Professor Mel Schwartz.
To find out more about Kol Halev,
visit standup.org.au
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