The Minister for Indigenous Australians Ken Wyatt has conceded he will "break hearts" in the Indigenous community but will put a plan to the Prime Minister to legislate for an Indigenous voice to Parliament and have a referendum to only "recognise" Indigenous people in this term of Parliament.

Key points: Mr Wyatt has received pushback on the notion of an Indigenous voice to Parliament

Mr Wyatt has received pushback on the notion of an Indigenous voice to Parliament He says he does not want it to be in the Constitution

He says he does not want it to be in the Constitution Mr Wyatt wants it done ahead of the next federal election campaign

Mr Wyatt said he had developed his timeline which includes legislating a voice first and then a referendum before the next federal election.

He said he would have discussions about the processes underway with all MPs in the Parliament including his fellow — mostly Labor — Indigenous MPs next week at a dinner to build bipartisan support.

Mr Wyatt said the referendum on constitutional recognition should be held before the next election.

Mr Wyatt said he is preparing to take a proposal to the Prime Minister that will include constitutional recognition, the voice and truth telling but Mr Wyatt concedes he has not been able to win over many of those opposed to legislating the voice to Parliament.

"When I am in communities, communities say, 'well who is going to listen to our voice? We're not fussed about a national voice. We want local issues dealt with, we want access to health, better education'," he said.

While he maintained he doesn't want the voice to be in the Constitution, there is still scope for constitutional recognition, but the specific form of words will need to be negotiated with, and agreed to, by Indigenous Australians and must be acceptable in a legal framework.

He said the timetable for the referendum process must be finalised before the next election.

"We don't want a referendum tied in with an election, because the election issues then will have an unintended consequence of the impact that we don't need," he said.

"And so it's important we have this pristine space in which the question can be put, the debates had, and then Australians make the decision".