And the name is First Peoples’ Assembly

“The Assembly will be powerful, independent and culturally strong. It will bring our people together for a common cause. We feel the name reflects this,” Treaty Advancement Commissioner Jill Gallagher said.

The Commission is inviting the Victorian Aboriginal community to design the logo for the new company.

“The Assembly will be owned by the community. It’ll be your voice and we want you to help build it,” Ms Gallagher said.

The Commission has released expressions of interest and the creator of the winning logo will be awarded a $15,000 prize.

There will be a mid-year election this year where the state’s Aboriginal community can vote for Victorian traditional owners to sit on the assembly.

Following feedback from the community, the Commission said it had changed the original operating model proposed in September 2018:

■ Victorian traditional owners who live interstate will be able to vote. This means every Victorian traditional owner aged 16 or over – no matter where they live – can be involved.

■ The minimum number of elected members for each electorate has increased to three to reflect best practice. There are now five electorates, rather than six, and there is more consistency as every electorate covers the country of multiple traditional owner groups. These changes will help make sure the assembly represents the views of communities across Victoria.

These changes do not affect the reserved seats for formally recognised traditional owner groups.

The Commission said it was also separately working to support traditional owner groups that are yet to achieve formal recognition.

The assembly will be made up of 33 Victorian traditional owners (21 elected and 12 from formally recognised traditional owner groups).

It will begin its work later this year to help set up the Treaty Authority – an independent umpire during treaty negotiations – and create the Negotiation Framework, which will be the ‘road map’ to treaties.