With the Voice to Parliament Referendum date announced to be October 14 2023, this thread will run in the lead up to the date for general discussions/queries regarding the Voice to Parliament.

The Proposed Constitutional Amendment

Chapter IX Recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples

129 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice

In recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Peoples of Australia:

there shall be a body, to be called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice; the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice may make representations to the Parliament and the Executive Government of the Commonwealth on matters relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples; the Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws with respect to matters relating to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice, including its composition, functions, powers and procedures.

Past Discussions

Here are some previous posts in this community regarding the referendum:

Common Misinformation

  • “The Uluru Statement from the Heart is 26 Pages not 1” - not true

Government Information

Amendments to this post

If you would like to see some other articles or posts linked here please let me know and I’ll try to add it as soon as possible.

  1. Added the proposed constitutional amendment (31/08/2023)
  2. Added Common Misinformation section (01/07/2023)

Discussion / Rules

Please follow the rules in the sidebar and for aussie.zone in general. Anything deemed to be misinformation or with malicious intent will be removed at moderators’ discretion. This is a safe space to discuss your opinion on the voice or ask general questions.

Please continue posting news articles as separate posts but consider adding a link to this post to encourage discussion.

  • Zagorath@aussie.zoneEnglish
    71·
    1 year ago

    to a population of ~5 million

    It probably would, actually, since that would be roughly the same ratio of polled people to total population as the polls used to determine the views of Australia as a whole.

    But the Indigenous population is actually much lower than 5 million anyway. Try just over 812,000.

    It’s not very complicated. You can look up the formula for how to calculate a margin of error based on your sample size, total population, desired confidence level, and the percentage of the portion that gave an answer. z × sqrt(p × (1-p)) / sqrt((N-1) × n / (N - n)), where p is the sample proportion, n is the sample size, N is the total population size, and z is the z-score associated with your desired level of confidence. I’m using a 99% confidence interval; I was going to use 95%, but it turned out that with this sample size you can actually be a lot more confident than that and still keep quite a low margin. The z-score is 2.58. When I put in your figure of 5 million (remembering that this is actually more than 5× too large!), 700 people, and 80%, the margin of error is a measly 3.9%.

    Real polling is more sophisticated than that, since they account for how representative they believe their sample is of the whole population, but that’s what it boils down to. They know what they’re doing far better than you or I, and they’re quite confident.

    If you want to oppose the Voice, do so, and face whatever accusations may be levied at you because of it. But don’t hide behind the lie that it’s a racist policy imposed by white people on Indigenous Australians. Because the evidence is clear on that matter: Indigenous Australians support it.

    • Whirlybird@aussie.zone
      36·
      1 year ago

      The evidence is not clear. A poll of 700 people is not “the evidence is clear”.

      Margins of error are not “truth”. You can decide you’ve got a margin of error of 1% and be wildly and massively incorrect in your results.

      Also not sure why you’re saying I’m hiding behind a lie that it’s a racist white policy? Where did that come from?