Ah, I must have misunderstood, sorry. Rereading your first reply to TinyBreak I see that now.

While I agree that increased bandwidth is crucial, I’m not so sure about leaving so many people and remote areas cut off over this. Especially as each generation of technology has shorter range (and therefore more expensive to service). Each generation of technology will have more people cut off, and I think there are implicit fears that one day, it will be them.

Maybe those fears are wrong, but it seems you’re just as dismissive of these fears as people that dismiss future benefits from greater bandwidth.

Also, I don’t know about looking to the US for inspiration, they also have a very large digital divide, largely based on the wealth of the local area.

They’ve been working on GIMP 3.0 for over a decade, which has non-destructive editing, as well as an upgrade to the UI toolkit (although actual UI changes are still to-do). They don’t want it to be this way, development has just been insanely slow. Mostly due to lack of developers and donations, although that has been changing recently.

They planned to have GIMP 3.0 out by May, but with so many delays it might be a few months yet.

I also forgot: houses became more expensive during the majority of the pandemic, while borders were closed. There was a short period with a fall, but only because they shot up sharply in the beginning.

I don’t buy the idea that immigration is the cause of the housing crisis, any more than young Australians buying their first home. I’m not even sure if it’s the investors either. They all may be sources of demand pressure, but I think there’s a sort of blockage in Australia’s housing market, and I would pin the blame of high housing costs on that blockage.

We live in an economy that assumes that the basic ideas of supply and demand lead to capital investment into production, leading to more supply. In housing, the way it’s expected to react to increased immigration is as follows:

1. Increased immigration leads to increased demand for housing.
2. Demand for housing leads to higher house prices.
3. Higher house prices lead to higher demand for construction.
4. Higher demand for construction results in more profits for construction companies selling houses.
5. Construction companies reinvest more of their profits into making houses, increasing supply of houses.
6. Increased supply causes housing prices to drop back to where they were before immigration rates increased. I takes a few years, but it’s supposed to be “self-adjusting”, always restoring prices back to a theoretical “ideal”, not counting inflation.

Except as we all know, it doesn’t do that, at least with housing. In particular, I think steps 3, 4 and 5 don’t follow in the modern Australian market. I think the key to solving the housing crisis, short of the government building it all themselves, is to figure out why 3, 4 and 5 don’t follow, and to change things so that they do.

It might look like decreasing immigration would at least alleviate demand pressure, but that’s just kicking the can down the road. There isn’t enough housing supply for demand caused by our natural birth rate, and so we’re accumulating demand pressure anyway. I view it as a distraction from discussing real solutions, that allow housing prices to not just increase more slowly, but fall.

I guess we just have different perspectives on how things currently are then, I view it as already the case that structural discrimination is at play, and that it’s very embedded into Australian government and society.

A referendum isn’t needed to consult with people.

While that does seem to be mostly correct, I think it’s also complicated. As I’m sure many people have said, previous consultative bodies have been abolished several times, and could only consult with the executive branch. This constitutional change will also enable representations be made to the legislative branch.

Could they have just tried to do so without a constitutional change? Probably. Yet they aren’t without reason for putting it in the constitution either.

And people shouldn’t be included/excluded from consultation just because of their race/culture/heritage.

People are right now, but perhaps not in ways explicitly stated by law. If we were a new country with a clean slate I might think this voice wouldn’t be necessary. Not only do we have a history of excluding people based on race, but I can see in the community that we still do so, and that will continue unless put a stop to.

I understand the unease of putting a specifically indigenous voice in there, but from what I understand even if parliament gives it the most power possible, it will still be less powerful than a traditional lobby group, only able to table discussions and research. Discussions I think should have happened decades ago.

It’s not a perfect solution, I don’t think I’ve met anybody who truly thinks that. But my opinion is that it would provide overall more help than harm, especially considering that I think the government’s inability to listen is structural, and not just individual fault.

I believe that any time the government is going to introduce or change laws, they should consult with the people those laws will affect. Regardless of the race or culture of those people.

This is the entire reason why this is being debated. The government has a horrendous track record of ignoring indigenous people on matters that affect them. Even to this day, and it appears to be a structural issue. Let us not forget what the Australian government has done in the name of “helping” them, resulting in the Stolen Generations, among other things.