Uluru Dialogue co-chair, Cobble Cobble woman Professor Megan Davis, has slammed previous coalition governments' management of First Nations concerns, labelling the lack of scrutiny directed towards them a "massive oversight" within the Voice debate.

Speaking to the Australia Institute following her recent entry in the Quarterly Essay journal Voice of Reason; Recognition and Renewal on Wednesday, Professor Davis said the No campaign's claim the Voice would increase bureaucracy was insignificant compared to "the risk of no change".

She said the bureaucracy argument has been a sticking point used to appeal to Australia's distaste for the "expansion of federal power". She also attributed the drop in support for the Voice in polling to people voting along party lines.

The federal Liberal Party and the Nationals have both taken official stances against the Voice.

Professor Davis said it was the Coalition who first put the wheels in motion for the proposal as it presently sits.

"You call it bureaucratic, but your government increased the bureaucracy. You say there'll be too much red tape, you increased the red tape. None of this has been put to the Opposition in relation to the campaign they're running," she said.

"It seems to me like such a massive oversight for the mainstream media to not be scrutinising them on what they did during their time in office. Because their kind of flagship policy, the Indigenous Advancement Strategy, which I write about in the essay, led to the Voice. It's their policy."

The Indigenous Advancement Strategy was introduced in 2014, a reform consolidating Indigenous policy under defined brackets.

Professor Davis accused Mr Dutton of being "quite happy" to have presided over a government that made "no substantive change" during their time in office aside from "dismantling" Closing the Gap.

"Dutton is not going to assess really the risk of no change, because he presided over the no change order," said.

She said the Morrison government 'devolved' its responsibilities to State and Territory Governments.

"They commenced very early on the dismantling of Closing the Gap. They walked away on leadership and money, and with the new iteration of Closing the Gap, they walked away from their constitutional responsibilities that the Australian people gave to them," Professor Davis said.

"And none of this is apparent to anyone in the Australian community because they're just not scrutinised. Some of the accelerated problems we have, happened under their government."

She said "industry" of Indigenous disadvantage is a funding pool businesses are unwilling to relinquish with the establishment of a body to drive positive change.

Citing findings from the Queensland Productivity Commission's report into remote communities, she said "the whole system exists to maintain Aboriginal welfare dependency".

"The Productivity Commission, at a national level, has said this is kind of $30 billion that's bandied around - probably about 27% hits communities. The rest of it is a huge industry on which a lot of people are making a lot of money off disadvantage. And don't want the status quo to change because they are literally going to lose businesses as a consequence of people getting control back over their lives."

"We need more Australians to understand that it is an industry but it's not an industry that Aboriginal people are benefiting from at all."

Professor Davis asked "what's the structural impact of nobody ever listening to what you have to say?".

She said the risk of no change "is so acute".