The Indigenous body charged with advancing a treaty in Victoria is optimistic that, whichever party wins government on 24 November, the historic process will continue – despite the opposition’s pledge to halt it.

Victoria’s treaty commissioner, Jill Gallagher, a Gunditjmara woman, remains confident that laws enacted on 3 July oblige any state government to progress the treaty process via the establishment and continued engagement with an Aboriginal representative body. The role of the body is to develop a framework in partnership with the government for negotiating a treaty, but not negotiate a treaty itself.

“The legislation is the first of its kind in Australia and it is a very strong piece of legislation,” she told Guardian Australia. “It adds some protection for us to continue the work that we’re doing even if we do get a change of government. I believe we’re too far down the track and there is no going back.”

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In July the opposition leader, Matthew Guy, told ABC radio that if his Liberal-National Coalition was elected, the treaty process would stop “at a state level”. Guy has repeatedly indicated that responsibility for a treaty with Australia’s first peoples belongs in the federal jurisdiction and not at state level.

The Advancing the Treaty Process with Aboriginal Victorians Act 2018 legislated that the government’s minister for Aboriginal affairs must make a declaration before 1 July 2019 to institute either a representative body that has been recommended by the treaty commissioner or a reasonable alternative to it.

When the bill was before the parliament’s upper house in June, the Liberal Bernie Finn indicated that a Coalition government may challenge any future treaty legislation in court. He said a treaty between the government and one section of the Victorian community was “nonsensical”, and that advancing a treaty would merely “provide fodder for lawyers and QCs … when this gets to the high court at some point”.

Victoria’s minister for Aboriginal affairs, Natalie Hutchins, told Guardian Australia the government was committed to “true reconciliation” through progressing a treaty with the state’s Indigenous peoples. In last year’s budget the government committed $28.5m to advancing the process. Some treaty advocates believe that funding will safeguard the process against a possible incoming Coalition government.

In September, at a statewide treaty gathering held in the members’ dining hall at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, the Labor government also announced that it had added another $1.5m to a program responsible for promoting engagement among Aboriginal and non-Indigenous Victorians on key matters relating to the treaty process.

The treaty community engagement program had only previously been allocated $700,000.

Despite the optimism, a Coalition government elected in South Australia in March axed that state’s treaty process shortly after taking office. At the time, the SA treaty process had advanced to the signatory stage and had funding allocated to it by the previous Labor government. The New premier, Steven Marshall – who also holds the Aboriginal affairs portfolio – told the ABC his government would focus on “practical outcomes” over “symbolic action”.

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In Victoria, the shadow minister for Aboriginal affairs, Tim Bull, told Guardian Australia: “State-based agreements have the potential to be vastly different in make-up and create cross-border anomalies.” In a prepared statement, Bull said the Coalition, in concert with the South Australian and New South Wales governments, believed discussion around the issue of self-determination and treaty are best dealt with at the federal level.

In response, Gallagher said the commission would be interested to hear if the shadow minister or Guy had told their federal colleagues that the treaty belonged in the national arena.

The Federation of Victorian Traditional Owner Corporations chief executive, Marcus Stewart, told Guardian Australia that the peak body, which represents six Aboriginal corporations, has had “numerous conversations” with the Coalition, but has not yet been provided with a sense of stability regarding the treaty process.

Despite this, Stewart said traditional owners remained positive and “hope that there could be a change” in the Coalition’s position. He said the federation would continue to work with whatever government was in power to advance the treaty process.

“Victoria is a progressive state,” Stewart said. “We’d hope that the Coalition could demonstrate leadership in this space. In 2010, they supported the Traditional Owner Settlement Act and internationally we’ve seen conservative governments sign off on treaties. So we can’t see why the Victorian Coalition wouldn’t be able to do the same.

“There’s a serious opportunity for a Coalition government in supporting treaty. There’s a lot of public momentum building behind it. It has considerable support from our non-Indigenous brothers and sisters. By not supporting treaty they’re jeopardising the greatest opportunity for genuine reconciliation that this state will see. That process of healing, truth-telling and moving together as a united people. That’s the risk.”

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The Greens say they will support the treaty process, while continuing to push for the explicit recognition of the unceded sovereignty of First Nations in Victoria, a clan-based approach to treaty negotiations, multiple treaties and a seat for each of Victoria’s 38 clans on the Aboriginal representative body established to negotiate the pathway to treaties.

The Greens’ spokewoman for Aboriginal affairs, Gunai-Kurnai and Gunditjmara woman Lidia Thorpe, became the first Indigenous female MP elected to the state parliament when she won a byelection for the inner-city seat of Northcote last year.

Other states and territories have recently committed to making meaningful agreements with traditional owners.

The Northern Territory Labor government signed a memorandum of understanding in June with four Aboriginal land councils and other peak Aboriginal bodies to progress a treaty over three years.

In Western Australia, Mark McGowan’s Labor government announced it would establish an Indigenous voice to parliament, similar to proposals for an enshrined Indigenous voice to the federal parliament contained within the Uluru Statement from the Heart. The NSW Labor party has also said it would initiate a state treaty process with traditional owners if elected in 2019.

Australia remains the only Commonwealth country that does not currently have a treaty with its Indigenous peoples.