The reference
What the Act actually does
A plain-English, clause-by-clause guide to the Statewide Treaty Act 2025. Short verbatim pulls, what they mean, and a link to the legislation and Hansard for every section — with the government's position published alongside ours.
Overview: what kind of law is this?
The Statewide Treaty Act 2025 gives legal force to Australia's first treaty between a government and Indigenous people. It converts the elected First Peoples' Assembly of Victoria into Gellung Warl — a permanent statutory body with rights to be consulted on legislation, question ministers and agencies, deliver an annual address to Parliament, and exercise decision-making in defined areas.
Our case is not that the people involved act in bad faith. It is that the Act builds a permanent, parallel representative structure available to one group of Victorians and not another — something no mainland state has done, eighteen months after Victorians voted No to a national Voice by a wide margin.
The treaty delivers practical accountability for closing the gap, was negotiated over years through an elected Assembly, and creates an advisory and oversight body — not a third chamber of Parliament. Parliament remains sovereign.
A separate electoral roll
In plain English: the Act maintains a permanent, race-based electoral roll for Gellung Warl elections, with enrolment from age 16 — two years younger than the franchise every other Victorian receives. One group of citizens gets a second democratic channel; everyone else gets one.
The roll governs only Gellung Warl's own elections. It takes nothing from anyone else's vote, and self-determination requires First Peoples to choose their own representatives.
Gellung Warl: a permanent statutory body
In plain English: the elected Assembly becomes a permanent institution of the Victorian state, with statutory functions, guaranteed funding, and decision-making authority over a defined and expandable set of matters. Its decisions in those areas are not subject to a vote of all Victorians.
Functions transferred or conferred include confirmations of Aboriginality, certain appointments, cultural heritage processes, and the naming functions described below.
Gellung Warl makes decisions only about matters that directly affect First Peoples, is elected, publishes its decisions, and is subject to IBAC, the Ombudsman and the Auditor-General.
Treaty-compatibility statements for every Bill
In plain English: every future Bill, on any subject, must be assessed against the treaty before Parliament may consider it. Combined with the obligation to notify Gellung Warl of laws and policies affecting First Peoples, this inserts a treaty test into the ordinary lawmaking that affects all Victorians.
Compatibility statements work exactly like Charter of Human Rights statements, which Parliament has prepared since 2006. They inform debate; they cannot block a Bill.
Permanent truth-telling
In plain English: the Yoorrook Justice Commission's work becomes an ongoing body with a role in how Victorian history is recorded, taught and commemorated — a standing institution with no sunset date and no further mandate from voters.
Truth-telling was the first recommendation of the Yoorrook Justice Commission and majorities of Victorians told the commission they support an honest account of the state's history.
Compulsory meetings and answered questions
In plain English: ministers — and the Chief Commissioner of Police — are required to attend representation meetings with Gellung Warl, and government agencies must answer its questions. An annual address to the Parliament is guaranteed. No comparable statutory access exists for any other community body, council, union, church or charity in Victoria.
These provisions mirror the powers of parliamentary committees and exist so that, for the first time, government must answer for outcomes rather than announce programs.
Nginma Ngainga Wara: the accountability body
In plain English: a dedicated body monitors government performance against treaty obligations, can compel responses, and can refer failures for further action. Victoria's other 6.5 million citizens hold government to account the old-fashioned way: an election every four years.
An independent accountability mechanism was recommended by Yoorrook precisely because successive governments of both parties failed to deliver measurable outcomes.
Naming authority
In plain English: statutory authority in the renaming of Victorian places, features and localities sits with a body elected by approximately 1% of the population. Any other Victorian with a view about the name of their own town lodges a suggestion form.
Naming functions operate within the existing Geographic Place Names framework, including public consultation requirements that remain unchanged.
Funding
In plain English: the Act obliges the State to fund the treaty bodies on an ongoing basis. Published estimates of the cost vary widely and are contested — we track the competing figures, including criticism of our own, on the fact-check tracker. ⚠ figures contested — see tracker
Treaty funding is modest against the state budget and replaces decades of programs that failed to close the gap; every dollar is acquitted through the normal audit framework.
Can it be repealed?
Yes. The Act is an ordinary statute of the Victorian Parliament. A government elected with a mandate to repeal it can do so by ordinary legislation. That is precisely what this campaign asks voters to make possible in November 2026 — and what the Coalition has publicly pledged to do.
What repeal requires: winning government, a Bill through both houses, and the discipline to follow through. Our pledge tracker holds that promise to the record.
Tearing up a signed treaty would damage Victoria's relationships and standing, and abandon an accountability framework both major parties once supported in principle.