Senator Lidia Thorpe has not ruled out establishing a new political party, describing the Blak sovereignty movement as her “new party room” and promising to be guided by activists and elders.
Three days after quitting the Greens citing the need not to be “constrained” by party positions, Thorpe told Guardian Australia on Thursday it “wasn’t so much a constraint, it was more the fact that we needed a Blak sovereign movement in this country” that motivated her to sit as an independent.
Thorpe signalled she will continue to argue against constitutional recognition and the voice “advisory body with no power”, warning that there are “progressive nos” who oppose it “for good reason”.
“The referendum is going to hurt us either way: yes or no,” she said. “It’s already hurting us – it’s creating so many divisions, black fellas are like ‘oh I want to say I don’t like this but I’m scared to say what I like – I don’t understand it.’
“It won’t be our decision – it’s the white people who decide for us.”
Thorpe’s comments come as the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, issued his most direct plea yet for bipartisan support on the voice referendum from the Liberal opposition, explicitly saying he was open to further negotiation and compromise on details.
“This process cannot be one of Labor v Liberal,” he said. “We have to rise above this.”
Albanese said the idea of achieving constitutional recognition through a voice “has come from the bottom up”, in reference to the Uluru statement from the heart.
Five years after she walked out of the Uluru convention, Thorpe issued a call for the expert working group advising the government on the voice referendum to re-engage with the Blak sovereignty movement which wants “to meet with those working groups”.
Asked if she planned to start a new political party or what structure her movement would take, Thorpe said “it’ll look like what the Blak sovereign movement tell me that it looks like.”
“There’s definitely quite a big movement of people … experts like [lawyer] Irene Watson from South Australia … academic Chelsea Watego, [writer] Ronnie Gorrie, Ted Wilkes, Nyungar from WA … it’s right across this country,” she said.
“They’re the people who are protesting, basically, and elders that have been around in the old [Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission] days.
Thorpe said that two elders had asked the government to support a “treaty convention” but it had refused because “they don’t want anything to hamper their [referendum] campaign”.
“It’s not about me,” she said. “It’s about a movement that hasn’t been represented. We’re organised. Very organised … I’ve never seen a movement so organised.”
Thorpe’s decision to quit the Greens, she said, came after the party resolved last week to support the voice to parliament during a party room retreat, which Thorpe said she didn’t attend due to a death in her family. She said it was the “icing on the cake” for her departure, announced on Monday afternoon, noting the Greens’ policy of supporting truth, treaty and voice – in that order.
The Greens’ decision to support the voice wasn’t formally announced until Monday evening, hours after Thorpe’s departure.
“There’s a policy there … [the] party room decided not to go with that Blak policy, and they can do that,” she said.
Thorpe said she was not representing the “Pauline Hanson nos” – referring to non-Indigenous conservatives who oppose the voice – but “progressive nos” who “no one wants to hear from”.
In parliament’s question time on Thursday, Albanese’s bluntest request for bipartisanship from the Coalition was seemingly rebuffed by the opposition leader, Peter Dutton.
Hours after confirming he would reinstate a public information pamphlet on the referendum, a request of the opposition, Albanese gave further concessions by saying he was open to suggestions about how a committee on the constitutional amendment proposal would operate, in a bid to increase support for the vote.
The shadow Indigenous Australians minister, Julian Leeser, who has backed Dutton’s call for more detail on the voice, asked Albanese to specify which details he would adopt of the co-design report authored by Marcia Langton and Tom Calma.
Albanese reiterated that the referendum was about the principle of the voice, and that the detail would be determined by the parliament of the day, but also pledged the “development of further detail” before the referendum.
Albanese implored the Coalition to have “an open mind” and back the change, adding he had met Dutton on six occasions.
But Dutton reiterated his position of seeking more detail on the voice before committing a stance.
“Every Australian has a big heart and wants to see an improved situation for Indigenous Australians,” he said. “There is no moral high ground here, there is no lecturing to take place.”
