KEY POINTS:
- Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has invited Peter Dutton to the Garma Festival.
- Dutton will not attend this year's event, to be held in the NT.
- The pair sparred over Voice to Parliament referendum.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has invited his counterpart to travel with him to Australia's largest Indigenous gathering, urging Peter Dutton to spend "less time on his dirt unit and more time in the red dirt of the Top End".
Two thousand people are expected to travel to the Northern Territory for this weekend.
Dutton, who opposes an Indigenous Voice to Parliament, has visited the NT multiple times this year but will not be present at Garma, which is likely to include major displays of support for the Voice.
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What is Garma and how did it begin?
Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton clashed over the Voice during Question Time on Wednesday. Source: AAP / Lukas Coch
Will the date of the Voice referendum be revealed at Garma?
Albanese used last year's event to unveil his proposed Voice referendum question, though he insists he won't reveal the date Australians will head to the polls this time around.
In Question Time on Wednesday, Dutton accused Albanese of failing to give a "straight answer" over his support for a First Nations Treaty - a long-term aim set out in the Uluru Statement from the Heart.
Albanese, who has repeatedly argued this year's referendum is unrelated to a Treaty, urged Dutton to attend Garma and "engage constructively, instead of this absolute nonsense".
Peter Dutton won't attend the Garma Festival, but has travelled to the NT multiple times this year. Source: AAP / Mick Tsikas
"I invite him to sit down with Indigenous Australians and talk with them. Not to them, not at them, but talk with them about why it is that they support and came up with the process of the Uluru Statement from the Heart."
The prime minister stressed the Uluru Statement was "led by the great Yunupingu", after greeting Albanese at Garma last year.
Opposition's absence from Garma Festival
Senior opposition members are typically present at Garma, first held in 1999.
While Dutton was absent from last year's event, then-Opposition Indigenous Australians spokesman Julian Leeser did travel alongside Albanese.
Leeser has since quit the frontbench to campaign for the Voice, after Dutton confirmed his opposition to the proposal.
His replacement, Nationals senator and Warlpiri/Celtic woman Jacinta Nampijinpa Price is not expected to travel to this year's event.
Anthony Albanese pressed on Treaty
Earlier on Wednesday, Albanese was pressed on whether he would move to draw up a Treaty should Australians vote for the Voice.
"No ... because that's occurring with the states," he told ABC radio.
Treaty negotiations are already underway at a state and territory level in Victoria, Queensland and the NT.
Albanese would not be drawn on whether the Commonwealth would have a role in negotiating treaties in the future.
"What the Commonwealth has a role in is the referendum which will be put to the Australian people in the last quarter of this year. That is what is happening."
