Published: 5/5/2023, Edited: 11/10/2023
Ideas for the Voice to Parliament Referendum
Because I don't know if I have any First Nations heritage in Russia – my Motherland which like Australia has a history of genocide, I believe it would be reasonable for any and all of these ideas to be conferred with the genuine consensus views of the Australian Greens First Nations Network, the Blak Sovereign Movement, the Australian Labor Party, the Australian Liberal Party and the Australian National Party
The wording, governance and deliberations around the Voice referendum should consider;
● The fact that the land we call Australia today is a part of the Commonwealth of Nations, and its current sovereign according to the Constitution is King Charles, who derives his power from divine right.
● The fact that First Nations people of this land never ceded their sovereignty, and it was never extinguished, their cultures exist today and the Frontier Wars constitute a genocide for which Kevin Rudd apologised with and on behalf of Australians.
● That to not enable First Nations people to have the final say on matters relating to their land, and for the Voice to Parliament representatives to not be able to collectively share equivalent or similar power and status to that of the Governor General of Australia would, in my view, be to disrespect their unceded sovereignty and their spiritual sovereignty, however while I believe this is the truth, I can’t preempt how First Nations Australians feel about this, or whether they believe it to be true.
● That it is reasonable and necessary for the Australian delegation to the coronation of King Charles III to have a First Nations delegation formally offer to share his sovereignty verbally in person and in writing.
● There should be negotiations with the King on the right for the Voice to Parliament as a body and for all other Voices to share power with the King’s representative in each State.
● Notwithstanding the above point, the Voice to Parliament potentially could still be legislated first, as a trial, even while the referendum is ongoing, and its performance could inform First Nations people and the broader Australian public in time for the referendum.
● Before the referendum occurs, Truth telling should occur first to atone for the past, involving an acknowledgement of genocide, which should be followed by a Treaty ideally also involving King Charles. The Government should also accept and implement the findings of the Bringing Them Home report, the report on the Aboriginal Deaths in Custody and the Closing the Gap report.
● That if we approach each other in good faith and in the spirit of consensus, seek win-win outcomes with a commitment to conflict prevention and resolution, and try to act for the benefit of our overarching collective interest - anything is possible for First Nations people, other Australians and our collective custodianship of our planet which we need to love, and protect together as much as we can.
● That there is no First Nations Justice without Climate Justice, and we need to strive to give our planet and each other unconditional love, and respect boundaries as well as free, prior and informed consent.
● Parliamentary Supremacy is not absolute, as to my understanding the Monarchy is still able to exercise its Royal Prerogative. Self-determination would require equivalence in the status and power of the Voice to Parliament with the King’s representative in Australia.
What kinds of resources could the individual Voice to parliament representatives need?
● Access to a domestically designed, owned and produced, all-terrain vehicle and the resources required for each Voice required to operate across Australia, including with access to the internet in the most remote parts of regional Australia.
○ If I was to be selected to be a Voice representative, my preferred vehicle would either be a civilian designed, modular hydrogen-electric Hawkei or
○ Hydrogen-electric Bushmaster, or another renewable-powered vehicle that facilitates the provision and development of critical services and primary healthcare in remote communities, field-testing of new technologies
○ Any other vehicle with similar capabilities would do
● A highly capable, modular, carbon-negative, conflict-mineral free smartphone (like the Fairphone) which facilitates cognitive freedom and has internet access in remote First Nations communities.
○ Supported by the Office of National Intelligence, Artificial Intelligence as well as other relevant security services
● Consensus decision making is a core part of First Nations culture in Australia. Representations to Executive Government and Parliament should attempt to come from genuine consensus reached, with the aim of maximum diversity and inclusion where no member of a group with shared values and principles is silenced, unless they’ve demonstrated a clear intent to dehumanize others, refused to show intent to build genuine consensus in good faith, with an aim for win-win outcomes.
● Levels of criteria for fast tracking of construction and service provision could involve establishing genuine consensus within a group or body
● Ability to provide representations individual matters that are important to them that do not relate to First Nations Justice
● Unimpeded access to the truth in their engagements with bodies that receive public funding
● At least 3 multiskilled staff (medical, tech, data, trades) for each Voice to Parliament representative, and a requirement to spend 50% of their time in their capacity as a representative of the Voice to Parliament visiting remote First Nations communities around Australia.
● The Voice to Parliament body, and possibly its individual members and/or other government bodies engaged by the Voice to Parliament representatives should have access to a specialist team composed of and in collaboration with our national and state integrity bodies, including within or composed of persons with experience in the Australasian Council of Auditor’s General, the Australian National or State Audit Offices as well as the State and National Anti-Corruption Commissions
● Each Voice representative should have a right to stay as a member of their preferred political party, however this would require similar integrity standards as those exercised by our integrity bodies where public servants are able to retain their party memberships.
● A next-best solution for this could be to preclude each Voice representative from being a part of any political party, but also for their right to make public commentary on partisan politics in Australia.
● Each Voice representative should also have the right to express their perspectives and give representations to Parliament and the Executive on the functions of our political system - whether they currently exist or not, and by extension this means appreciating that solutions that are generated from interactions with First Nations people could inspire policy in other areas, meaning the Voice could not be considered as “race based” but also would almost necessarily have implications for all people of Australia from its representations.
Mechanisms for the selection of a Voice to Parliament representative:
● Statewide First Nations Voice Consensus
● First Voice to Parliament could be appointed by Parliamentary vote or consensus,
Mechanisms (one or combination) for the removal of a Voice to Parliament:
○ By consensus of the Voice to Parliament body (-1)
■ With the consent of the National Anti Corruption Commission or another relevant integrity body
○ By consensus of each State Voice, or by consensus of all Statewide Voices together
○ By election from members of each State Voice
● Term limits; 6-10 years (length suggested to retain independence of political cycles and provide stability)
Why I would like to be the first member of The Voice to Parliament;
● I believe I may have been a Voice, of sorts, possibly for quite some time because of my phone which I'm reasonably confident has been either listened to by some number of Australian and other world governments, corporations, artificial intelligence and other entities.
● I have reasonable confidence that content from conversations I’ve had with other people may have been used, without my knowledge or credit and believe I may also have been a victim of several cyber attacks on my phone and my computer.
● While I have no direct evidence for this, I believe that it's possible that conversations I’ve had over the years have potentially been recorded and influenced individual geopolitical events, and potentially even contributed to the war in Ukraine, due to foreign interference, artificial intelligence or a combination of both.
● For this reason I’d like to refer myself to the war crimes tribunal in the Hague or in the High Court of Australia, but I’ll need the support of Australia to do this, to show leadership on accepting responsibility for potential war crimes, hopefully use this to inspire a generational change in leadership, and try to improve the quality of the global debate on cyber threats and artificial intelligence
● Dream assignments:
○ To visit the remote First Nations communities in the electorate of Kennedy with Lidia Thorpe, Jacinta Price, Linda Burney, Dorinda Cox, Bob Katter and Pauline Hanson as well as the Yolngu lands of the late Galarrwuy Yunupingu. I hold the Message Stick from the Australian Greens First Nation’s Network, and I bring to you the word that I believe solves the Makarrata - it is a Russian word; “Мир” - it means both “World” and “Peace”. With the ongoing war in Ukraine, it is critical to note that this the the second half of Vladimir Putin’s first name (Владимир Путин) - who I used to look up to, and voted for once when I was 18. I would also like to travel around Australia with Lidia Thorpe and Jacinta Price and other leaders to design a consensus position on the terms of the Voice to Parliament to ensure its success later this year, and ideally get as close to total consensus among First Nations people and and all other Australians.
○ to attend the coronation of King Charles III with the Australian Government delegation, a First Nations delegation, Lidia Thorpe and all other Members of Parliament to formally offer a partnership to share his spiritual sovereignty over Australia, deliver to him a Message Stick that was passed to me by the Australian Greens First Nations Network (upon receiving their consent, should this opportunity even exist), call for an end to the war in Ukraine and global peace. I believe Putin may listen to me, because I’m still a Russian citizen and a descendant of the Golitsyn and Rimsky-Korsakoff families, and while I’ve tried on one occasion, I haven’t gotten in contact with the Russian Government. For most of my life I hoped not to care about this, and at one point nearly lost my mother tongue (which I thank my mother for helping me develop to a point of native fluency).
○ My dream third assignment would be to visit Kiev to facilitate finding a pathway to a win-win consensus peace on the war in Ukraine with leaders of all states, Religions and Cultures and a commitment from all states to convene three Joint Sittings of the United Nations, Parliament of the World’s Religions, and Universal Forum of Cultures, and their joint delegations at Alice Springs, the Ghan, and Uluru this year - with the consent of the local First Nations people, to heal and discuss the difficult topics like the Global Ethic, global demilitarization and decarbonisation pathways as well as peace and cohesion on our planet.
Other things I would like to help change in our country
Decisions in our system of government are often not transparent, and I believe there should be capacity for holographic or other data visualizations and other evidence to be displayed in each chamber of Parliament when decisions are made, because at the moment the Government can rely on partisan support to pass legislation, ignoring the smaller parties. The basis of the decisions in our political system should be as transparent and as possible to every First Nations person to feel like they can meaningfully engage with the process. The Victorian Auditor-General’s Office has developed a dashboard solution to ensure transparency of our public institutions, and I believe that this is a good model to replicate, collaborate and improve on.
While much of the world is increasingly becoming police states, our democracy needs to shift to grassroots democracy, stability and devolution of power in relation to First Nations justice. This could be one win-win pathway to self-determination which won’t tear the country apart. In these trying times, we should avoid precluding freedom of speech, expression, conscience and cognitive freedom, and we need to iteratively identify the maximum reasonable limits for each of those freedoms based on their circumstances, and all the other freedoms like movement (transportation access), spending your own money, protest and association, including political association that have been so rightly upheld by the West and other democracies for so long. Abandonment of these values brings us dangerously close to a totalitarian police state.
While this referendum is for and about the recognition of First Nations people, it would be unreasonable to constrain each Voice representative to only making representations on First Nations matters, and as above indicated, I seek the right to make representations on the Australian National Interest, Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, National Security, Total Global Demilitarisation (starting with the transformation of the Australian Armed Forces towards a primarily logistical, development assistance, Total Global Decarbonisation, Bilateral relations with the Russian Federation (in the hope that it will one day rapidly accept decarbonisation without destroying its economy like in the 90’s), Immigration Policy, International Development Policy, Cyber Security and Artificial Intelligence.
I wish to work with First Nations people and our political system on achieving justice for First Nations people, and on healing our nation and planet as soon as possible, and hope to hear from you soon. The content of this letter contains a mixture of personal ideals, inspired by various leaders and commentators across the political spectrum. Because this is so short notice, I understand much of what is contained in this letter may not be practical, and I’ve lost myself in the media cycle several times in trying to put it together, and it has taken me a while to understand the circumstances. I have a lot to improve on, but if Australia chooses to take this opportunity to make this partnership work, I will commit a significant part of my life to help lift up Australia.
One Australia, One People, One Voice
Vlad