The First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria is negotiating with the Victorian Government a set of standards and processes by which treaties will be negotiated.
Those rules are known as the Treaty Negotiation Framework and could be agreed upon as soon as early October.
The Assembly is proposing that within that framework, an overarching statewide Treaty be negotiated by a body representing Traditional Owners in Victoria, and that localised treaties be negotiated by individual Traditional Owner groups for their specific Country.
The Assembly is proposing that it represent Traditional Owners in future negotiations for the statewide Treaty, but when it comes to talks for localised treaties, Traditional Owner groups, who sometimes contest rivals’ claims over disputed lands, are likely to have to work together when negotiating with the government.
“We want the framework to support Traditional Owners to decide how they want to approach negotiations,” Assembly co-chair Aunty Geraldine said.
“This won’t be a one-size-fits-all thing, it’s about empowering groups to choose and shape their own pathway forwards.”
Aunty Geraldine said members were still working through how different Traditional Owner groups in the same area would be supported to form single Treaty ‘negotiation delegations’ for the one region.
“The framework is a very inclusive one,” she said.
“All Traditional Owner groups, whether they are currently recognised by the government or not, will be invited to consider whether they want to be involved in Treaty-making and do it their way. The door is open.”
The soon-to-be-created Treaty Authority will be tasked with helping to settle any disputes between groups. The authority will be led by First Nations people and use culturally appropriate practices to help resolve differences.
The Assembly said that under the proposed framework, if a Traditional Owner group, that was not already a recognised First Nations party, wanted to negotiate a Treaty with the government, it would first self test itself against the standards set out in the framework to see if it qualified.
That test considers criteria such as whether the group has links to the land it wants to negotiate over and whether it has a governance system.
If the group does qualify, the Treaty Authority will register the application and provide access to the self-determination fund, which will enable the group to fund its negotiations.
The government will be notified and it too will have to meet certain standards laid out in the framework to participate in negotiations.
That process will trigger notifications for neighbouring nations and groups, who could be invited to participate in the negotiation.
Before the Assembly can represent Traditional Owners in negotiations for the statewide Treaty, the government has to agree to that and then the Assembly must also hold its own election to seek a mandate for that step to be taken and for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community in Victoria to elect members to pursue those talks.
“Invasion took a severe toll on the many nations in this state, but this process is helping us address the fault lines and mend some of the common threads,” Aunty Geraldine said.
The Assembly said negotiations on treaties could be under way within a year.
