Milton Dick (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Like many of my Labor colleagues and those opposite, I rise to speak in support of the Marriage Amendment (Definition and Religious Freedoms) Bill 2017 and, in doing so, in support of marriage equality. Australia is a proud, progressive country, and has long led the world when it comes to human rights and protection from discrimination in our society. Our nation's rich egalitarian spirit is a product of our history and a product of our forebears. Indeed, in 1902 Australia was the very first country in the world to give women the right to vote in federal elections and also the right to be elected to parliament on a national basis. Why? Because in Australia we stand for equality. In 1962, the Commonwealth Electoral Act provided that Indigenous Australians should have the right to enrol and vote at federal elections. Why? Because in Australia we stand for equality. Today we have the chance to again stand for equality by legislating for marriage equality—a once-in-a-generation chance to again show that Australia is a proud and progressive country that treats everybody equally before the law and treats everyone equally when it comes to love.

All of us in this place have an enormous responsibility to prove that everyone is equal when it comes to the law and to love. The journey to reach this point has been a long one and it has not been an easy one for the LGBTIQ community in Australia. The first bill introduced to parliament to legislate marriage equality occurred over 10 years ago, and we have since seen 22 failed attempts. This includes multiple coalition governments who have sought to prevent or delay this rightful course of action. The latest of these manoeuvres was the postal plebiscite to tell us what we already knew—that Australians are overwhelmingly in favour of marriage equality. It was a waste of $100 million to appease the right-wing conservatives in a desperate last-ditch attempt to prevent the inevitable.

Whilst, yes, the voter turnout was very strong, and, yes, over 61 per cent of Australians voted in favour of marriage equality, the lack of leadership by this weak Prime Minister meant that hundreds and thousands of gay and lesbian Australians had to endure months of speculation about the legitimacy of their relationships and sexuality. Now we see the Prime Minister and some of those opposite trumpet their contribution as some sort of achievement. They should be ashamed, not proud. It was not an achievement for the Brisbane woman who had rocks thrown at her home whilst the vandals yelled homophobic slurs. It wasn't an achievement for the 14-year-old who received death threats from a schoolfriend's dad over supporting same-sex marriage. It wasn't an achievement that saw posters plastered across our cities with slogans such as 'A vote for gay marriage is a vote for child abuse'. There should be no sense of achievement from those opposite. They should be ashamed, not proud.

What we should have been doing is what we are doing right now by having this debate on the floor of the people's parliament. If only the Prime Minister had had the backbone in the first place, we would not have subjected LGBTIQ Australians to those atrocities, and this could have happened a long time ago. So, no, Prime Minister: when you said:

It will be forever to the credit of the coalition that this momentous social change occurred …

you are misplaced. You are out of line and you are insensitive to the enormous damage this plebiscite did to thousands of LGBTIQ Australians.

What was intriguing about the postal plebiscite, however, was those who prided themselves on championing so-called free speech being the first to condemn and to attempt to shut down those voices they did not agree with—those who supported marriage equality. This included—to the bewilderment of the Australian public—the member for Warringah suggesting the censorship of American rapper Macklemore at the NRL Grand Final and banning the playing of 'Same Love', an extraordinary act coming from someone saying that the freedom of speech is quite a sacred principle.

Nonetheless, Australians turned out in force to support marriage equality, including in my own electorate of Oxley, where 60.3 per cent of locals voted in support to almost match the national figure of 61.6 per cent. I was also proud to see my home state of Queensland vote in support, with 60.7 per cent of people returning their ballot forms marked 'yes'. Like most other electorates, it was the youngest and oldest in my local community with the highest representation in the figures. This included several locals at a retirement village near my house in Durack who made a point of stopping me at a visit recently to inform me of their support for marriage equality. They told me that the time had come to pass this into law so that all Australians could be treated equally. That's not to mention the hundreds and hundreds of emails my office has received that were sent from far and wide by people to show their support. These came from not only LGBTIQ Australians but from heterosexual Australians, young Australians and old Australians to show their overwhelming support. This includes one from Jennifer in the Centenary Suburbs of my electorate, who said: 'I believe the time has come to treat us all equally. This is one of the most important issues of our time and it is time to stand up.'

I want to focus on the effort in my home state of Queensland, which was led by so many committed activists from Labor over so many years. I'm proud tonight to recognise the strong leadership of Queensland Premier Anastasia Palaszczuk; Deputy Premier Jackie Trad; my good friend and long-term marriage equality campaigner, the mighty Grace Grace; Shannon Fentiman; Attorney-General Yvette D'Ath and her groundbreaking work as an equality campaigner; and my brother, Cameron Dick, a minister in the Queensland government. I'm proud of his work and achievements in the portfolio of Attorney-General, as Minister for Education and as health minister, and his support for the LGBTIQ community. He is someone who has always stood up on the side of equality.

Evan Moorhead, Jon Persley and Rainbow Labor in Queensland worked alongside so many grassroots activists in Queensland to deliver this change. There were people like Shelley Argent, who is in the gallery this evening. Thank you, Shelley, for your commitment to your family and to so many families here in Australia. I also want to thank members of this place on the other side—people like Trevor Evans, my colleague from Queensland, Trent Zimmerman, Tim Wilson, Warren Entsch and, of course, Senator Dean Smith.

To my own friends, who have shared their own painful stories with me, I know what this decision means. For many of my best friends—my dear friend Tom Kenny, Ben Mulcahy, Tony Rickards, Nino Lalic and Mat Cooper—I know what this all means. When you get married, you can ask me to be the best MC at your wedding! And so it is.

It's incumbent on us, the members of this House, to make it a reality. We cannot afford any further delays that would see this process drawn out any further. In 2015, the Leader of the Opposition, the member for Maribyrnong, introduced his own private member's bill in an attempt to legislate for marriage equality. Speaking on the bill at the time, he said:

We cannot assume this change is inevitable. We cannot imagine it will just happen. We, the 44th Parliament, have to step up to rise to the moment.

Prior to and since that time, the Leader of the Opposition and Labor have been leaders in calling for marriage equality to become a reality. This also includes my other Labor colleagues, such as the member for Sydney in her relentless campaigning and advocacy, the member for Isaacs in his continued passionate work to ensure this parliament would see a bill for marriage equality, and of course, as many have said before, the amazing Senator Penny Wong, who has been at the forefront of this debate and this cause for many, many years—because that's what the Labor Party does. We show leadership when others won't. We stand up for what's right when others won't. We stand up for the fair go when others won't. And we stand for equality when others won't. We stand for an inclusive and accepting Australia where your relationship is not judged by the gender of the person that you love but simply by love. It's time to get this done. I commend this bill to the House.

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