What was claimed
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in a speech that anyone who votes No in the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum is racist.
Our verdict
False. There’s no record of the prime minister ever saying that No voters are racist.
It’s claimed that Albanese declared in a speech that anyone who votes No in the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum is racist.
This is false. There is no record of any such statement by the prime minister. This Facebook post (archived here) makes the claim on June 9 as part of an 857-word tirade against the proposed Indigenous advisory body, which Australians will vote on later this year.
“PM Albanese in his speech said: ‘Anyone who votes no is racist,’ ” the post caption says. “How dare he insult the vast majority of Australia’s population.”
The heading of the post says “REASONS FOR THE NO VOICE VOTE SUCCEEDING”, and the full text has been shared by other users here and here who attribute it to “Writer Mal Crowley From Alice Springs”. However, the edit history of the original post shows that the text did not include the claim about the prime minister calling No voters racists when it first appeared online at 11.09am on July 9.
It was then shared in an anti-voice Facebook group where at 4.59pm another user commented: “Add to that … Albo’s words in his speech ‘Anyone who votes No is racist’ ! Disgusting!!” One minute later, that same user then edited the comment to add: “We all as Australians do not deserve his name calling!”
The original post was then edited at 7pm to add the claim about Albanese.
AAP FactCheck found no record of the prime minister saying that No voters were racist in any speech or other public comment. Albanese did criticise people making doomsday predictions about the Voice in his Lowitja O’Donoghue Oration at the University of Adelaide on May 29 2023.
“Australians won’t succumb to their appeals to fear and their even more ludicrous invitations to jump at our own shadows,” Albanese said in his speech. “That’s because Australians have a healthy scepticism of doomsayers, a scepticism kept in good health by memories of all the predictions offered by the Chicken Littles of the past.”
Earlier that day at a press conference, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton criticised the pre-released text of the prime minister’s speech: “The prime minister [is] out there name-calling people and others suggesting that people are racist because they don’t support the Voice. It’s completely and utterly unacceptable.”
On May 30, Albanese was asked about his speech during a radio interview in Adelaide.
“Prime minister, the Opposition Leader, Peter Dutton yesterday accused you of name-calling and suggesting that those who oppose the Voice are racist. Are people who don’t support the Voice to Parliament referendum racist?”
Albanese replied: “No, people will have a range of views and they’re entitled to it.”
Dutton didn’t accuse the prime minister of calling No voters “racist”. He accused Albanese of “name-calling” and said that “others [were] suggesting that people are racist because they don’t support the Voice”. Like the radio host, Facebook users appear to have mixed up Dutton’s comment.
Either way, Albanese dismissed the premise that he had said or thought that No voters were racist.
The verdict
The claim that Albanese said in a speech that anyone who votes No in the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum is racist is false. There is no record of the prime minister saying that in any speech or any public statement.
False. The claim is inaccurate.
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