Corporate Australia's referendum reckoning
Many of our biggest companies were outspoken in their support for the Voice. The results of Saturday's vote indicate Australians either weren't listening, or didn't like what they heard.
The resounding failure of the Voice referendum raises some important questions for corporate Australia to consider when it comes to social issues. Namely, should it be a concern that our biggest companies and the people leading them seemed to completely misread Main Street on an issue like this? And did the overwhelming support for the Voice from the top end of town actually hinder rather than help the Yes campaign?
The answer to both might be in the affirmative. Big business overwhelmingly backed the Voice to the point where the list of companies who supported it is too long to go into here (a handful of them include BHP, Rio Tinto, all of the big four banks, Telstra, Qantas and Wesfarmers).
Among the lobby groups, the Business Council of Australia was a vocal supporter, as were the Governance Institute, the board of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, and the AI Group.
Despite all of this, Australians emphatically rejected the proposal for a constitutionally enshrined body to advise Parliament on Indigenous issues. The 60% of constituents who voted No would include customers, shareholders and employees of our biggest companies.
