John Moran is a writer and policy advisor based in Brisbane, Australia.

He is with us to speak about an important vote that took place recently, one that raises issues

important really to all Western nations at the present time. Welcome, Mr. Moran.

Hello, Mark. I must be with you. All right. Okay, tell us what was the issue briefly that was on

the ballot? Well, we had a stand-alone referendum ballot, separate, obviously, from a general election

where you're electing governments and the like.

This was a specific issue, and the issue at stake was, if you like,

the role of Indigenous Australians, that is Aboriginal and Torres Strait

Islander Australians in Australian society, specifically their place in the national

constitution.

And there was an effort to try and get them a special place in the Constitution,

namely through what's called a voice to Parliament is the first step.

And that was that, similar to your Congress,

they would have a special group of people elected amongst indigenous people themselves

who would have the constitutional

right to sit in this new body that would sit beside the Parliament, that is the House

of Representatives and the Senate, would sit beside the Parliament and the executive government

and provide advice or representations

is actually the proper word, not advice, representations on issues that they believed to be of

significance to them as indigenous people and they would provide advice or thoughts on legislation or government policy, whatever

was coming up, or the budget, the annual national budget and so on.

And they would provide their thoughts and their input to the legislature and the executive

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