Everyone hates ScoMo. Its as simple as that. Its not that Albo was the leader that was going to change everything with great policies, its just that he wasn't Scott Morrison. Good luck to him.
Final results House of reps (151 members) ALP 77 L/NP Coalition 58 Greens 4 Independents 10 Former coalition Government lost 10 seats to ALP, 2 to Greens and 6 to independent candidates. ALP lost one seat to Greens and 1 to an independent candidate. Senate (76 members, 36 continuing, 40 elected at this election) L/NP coalition 17 continuing, 15 won, total 32 ALP 11 continuing, 15 won, total 26 Greens 6, 6, 12 One Nation 1, 1, 2 JLN 1, 1, 2 UAP 0, 1, 1 Independent 0, 1, 1
I assume you mean NZ's election. This doesn't surprise me at all, unfortunately. All my friends who I regularly communicate with hated Jacinda and vowed to vote National, even though Jacinda had stepped down ages ago. I never understood the hatred.
I don't really agree with you here, although probably about 10% of the No vote was aimed at doing this. The Referendum was a proposal to alter the Constitution by adding the following chapter These additions, whilst relatively harmless, would have been the first part of our constitution that isn't directly related to the structures of Government or the relationships between our state and federal governments. Our Constitution is a dry document that doesn't espouse great ideals or establish any particular rights for things that aren't strictly Govt related. There are a couple of individual rights but they are mainly restricting the federal Govts legislative power with the states still having the power to override those rights if they desire. The campaign itself was a pretty ordinary effort, with the Yes campaign seemingly preaching to the converted and not establishing a need for the change other than just the vibe and it should help improve things for them if we listen to first nations people on things that affect them (implying we don't now). The No campaign was basically a huge scare campaign with lots of lies spread about what would happen but they all added up to why should 3% of the population have more rights than the other 97%. No referendum has passed without bipartisan support in Australia, and this one was pretty much doomed when the Opposition Leader decided to oppose it after a bad by election loss in an effort to cement his leadership. The process for this proposal actually began under the regime of the Conservative parties a decade ago with both parties repeatedly promising to put up a referendum at the previous two elections. In the end, I think the biggest problem with the amendments was that everything in it could have been established under legislation without being in the Constitution. Personally I thought this change, although harmless, was unnecessary.
Mmm, wonder how the Original People think about this rejection. My two cents it's not well received. My problem with the stance of @almango first is that legislation is easily changed. My second problem with it is that putting it in the constitution is also an acknowledgement of the existence of the Original People. Rejecting it is indeed flipping the bird. My third problem with it is that embedding it in the constitution is a safeguard against populistic toying with it, like when it's only put in legislation. You really need to go a long route to make a change in the constitution, which would be a safe guard against eroding it or worse.
But what a sea change it would have been for an Anglo colonial state to finally start trying to atone for its sins.
As for legislation being easily changed the effect of the proposed amendment was that the "Voice" had to be established by legislation and it could be modified at any time.by the Parliament as it so desired (clause iii). The amendments gave a future Parliament the power to reduce the voice to one person appointed by the Government with the ability to make one submission a year limited to one A4 page if it desired. As to recognition, not sure why it needs to be in a constitution. The history is there regardless of if its mentioned in a constitution or not. As I mentioned above, our constitution is a pretty dry document limited to describing the functions of our federal government and its relationships with the States. On average our first nations peoples have a lower standard of living than the rest of us, with lower life expectancy, lower incomes etc. I think its more important to continue to try and address those issues rather than create the only non Government body in the constitution. Our record in improving these things is mixed. There have been improvements but the gaps are still there. It's true the racists would have voted No, but the rest of the country had a pretty mixed opinion. Even amongst the first nations people there was a vocal No campaign. The leaders of the formal No campaign were basically conservative politicians (or would be ones) trying for some reason to ingratiate themselves amongst the hard right conservatives who now that the campaign is over will just ignore then again. There was also some activists who were opposed from the opposite end, who wanted to establish "sovereignty" for themselves, whatever that means in the context of Australia. Modern Australia has people from all parts of the world and all races. The only requirement is that you become Australian with your first loyalty to this country. Most recoil at the idea of a separate sovereignty. Its hard to work out what groups voted for yes or no. A general trend was that more affluent inner city areas voted yes with outer suburban and regional areas voting no. In remote booths dominated by Aboriginal voters the yes was around 75%.
From what I've seen New Zealand is a good example of how doing so is the proverbial rising tide that lifts all boats.
I haven't followed this much, but one of the things that has struck me for a while is that everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, governmental has English and Maori. And it is very prominent.
And te reo Māori is becoming more prominent as well. One of the big differences post-pandemic from pre-pandemic is that newscasts will now start each segment (sports, weather, etc.) with a Māori sentence or two, with weather providing both the English and Māori names for locations. Reparations began with the Waitangi Tribunal back in the 1990s (?). Some iwi (tribes) squandered the money but others invested wisely. Overall NZ society is doing quite well. Reparations have not seemed to harm anyone, at least from my outsider vantage point.