Last week, the Joint Select Committee on Constitutional Recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples handed down an interim report, with the full report due next June. A panel appointed to advise Prime Minister Tony Abbott on the issue will also report soon.

The 1967 referendum was one of those unsuccessful passed referendums. We all imagined that the ''successful'' 1967 referendum did the job to ''recognise'' indigenous people. True, it obliterated the disgraceful provision that did not allow indigenous people to be counted for the purposes of electoral entitlement.

It also expanded the Commonwealth’s law-making power from making laws ''with respect to races of people other than the Aboriginal race'' (which was to stay with the states) to also include the Aboriginal race. So, as a result of the 1967 referendum, the Commonwealth gained the power ''to make laws with respect to the Aboriginal people''.

In 1967, the 91 per cent of people who voted "yes" naively imagined this meant the Commonwealth could make laws to benefit Aboriginal people. It was only after the Howard government launched the intervention that made laws that restricted and discriminated against Aboriginal people did we realise that ''with respect to'' did not only mean nice things but also discriminatory and detrimental things.

The High Court, quite correctly, held that ''with respect to'' (Aboriginal people or anything else) had to be given a wide meaning. It had to mean laws that were detrimental to Aboriginal people as well as laws that were beneficial. Perfect constitutional reasoning, shameful political result.

So we are now having another referendum to fix the mess. All very well and let’s do it. But Pandora’s box is waiting to be opened here.

If we are going to enshrine in the Constitution some special provision to prevent the Commonwealth from making laws that are detrimental to indigenous people, why stop there? Why not have a constitutional provision to prevent the Commonwealth from discriminating against people on the grounds of age, religion, sexuality or gender? The logic is the same. The warm fuzziness of indigenous constitutional recognition is different.

And if we are going to recognise indigenous Australians as an important symbolic gesture, why not recognise that an Australian chosen by Australians should be at the apex of our constitutional system as an equally important symbolic change?

In short, we should not buy just a piecemeal, feel-good provision for indigenous people that would not contribute much materially to their cause.

Clearly, the much-vaunted 1967 referendum was a failure, otherwise why would we have to revisit the matter now? And let’s look at the other so-called successful referendums.

In 1906, Australians changed the election cycle of Senate terms so they began on July 1 instead of January 1. It has caused strife through subsequent electoral cycles, most recently with elected senators having to wait 10 months to take their seats this July 1.

Instead, the shemozzle of Senate and House terms should have been recognised and fixed with a system of senators holding office for two terms of the House.

While we're at it, why not fix elections for the House for the first Saturday in December every three years. Let's also get rid of the requirement that when the House is expanded, the Senate must be expanded proportionately.

In 1910 and 1928, Australians voted that the Commonwealth would be able to take over state debts. The change was unnecessary. Section 96 grants would have allowed it and, in any event, who was going to argue against someone taking over their debts?

We did not need the 1946 referendum, to enable the Commonwealth to hand out social security. Again, it could have been done with Section 96 grants, and again, who is going to challenge a handout?

The 1977 changes to ensure someone from the same party replaced dead or retired senators could have been done with legislation. And it could have been done without the 720 words of waffle in the 1977 amendment. I have described the effect in one sentence.

Giving the vote in referendums to the territories was meaningless – it will never change a referendum result. And making judges retire at 70 is now proven to be a silly waste, as changes to health and fitness allow people to work well beyond that age.

So, what a sorry history of constitutional change. Thirty-six of 44 referendums defeated, and of the eight accepted, all were either defective or unnecessary.So what changes do we need?

Indigenous recognition, a republic, fixing the electoral cycle and removing discrimination I have mentioned. We should go beyond discrimination and have a bill of rights with things such as free speech in it. Some other legal technicalities could also be fixed to widen the Commonwealth's spending power and enable federal courts to deal with state matters when the litigants agree.

So spare us this paltry patch-up job to repair the defects of 1967 and get on with the job of serious and significant constitutional reform to give pride, not only to indigenous Australians, but to all Australians.

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The old autocratic commies of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union tried to trick the people of ethnicities different from the central power base. They gave them regional borders far wider than their ethnic and linguistic boundaries to make them feel better while they were under the yoke.

Alas, after the collapse of the Soviet and Yugoslav entities and the devolution of power to those ethnicities, the borders made no sense. Russia and Serbia were too small and millions of Russians and Serbs found themselves ruled by non-Russians and non-Serbs. It was ripe for conflict. We are witnessing that now in Ukraine.

The only way the West can get some control of this and stop the violence is to give in to Russian demands, but in a democratic way.

US president Woodrow Wilson’s 14 points of a century ago should be dusted off. The US, Europe and Ukraine should accept ''self-determination'' as a right. An internationally supervised plebiscite should be arranged to redraw the borders peacefully.

That would be better than the Russians doing it by force, and it would have been better than letting the Serbs do it through ''ethnic cleansing'' in the 1990s.

crispinhull.com.au