Anthony Albanese's Voice referendum a big gamble trends now
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has limited options before him should the referendum on a national Indigenous Voice to Parliament fail, experts say.
Mr Albanese's first promise when he became prime minister last May was to implement - in full - the Uluru Statement from the Heart, which calls for a constitutionally enshrined advisory voice.
But with mounting criticisms about a lack of detail, there are early signs Mr Albanese could fall short in getting the promise over the line.
According to some experts Anthony Albanese is taking a gamble by taking the national Indigenous Voice to Parliament
The Prime Minister is refusing to consider any option other than a successful referendum.
In doing so, he refuses to be drawn on whether a failed constitutional vote would mean he would consider legislating a Voice body anyway.
Mr Albanese went so far as to say conflating the two was like comparing rugby league and rugby union.
'I am determined to do what I can, along with so many other Australians who will be campaigning for a 'yes' vote from across the political spectrum,' he said this week.
'And that is my focus.'
Constitutional law expert Anne Twomey said if the referendum failed, there were still options available to legislate a Voice - but that would quickly become a 'political problem'.
Constitutional law expert Anne Twomey said if Mr Albanese did proceed with legislating a Voice in the event of a failed referendum, it would become a major political problem
'Technically, there's still a way to legislate even if the Voice referendum fails,' she told said.
'So you could legislate to try and ensure that there was some organised mechanism for Indigenous people to express views in relation to matters affecting them, but I suspect there would be difficulty doing that because it's a notion that would have been rejected at the constitutional level.'
'It would be very difficult for a government to come by and say 'we'll just do that by legislation', so there would be a political problem with doing that,' she explained.
'But from a legal point of view, the race power in the Constitution still exists - that's the power that allows the Commonwealth to make special laws with respect to Indigenous Australians if there's a need to do so.
'So it could still exercise that power in that way that involves Indigenous Australians making representations or feeding their views into government, but we come back to the problem that it's a political problem if the Australian people have already voted against it at a constitutional level.'
North Sydney independent MP Kylea Tink said that calling for legislation outlining the Voice is a
