Jenny McAllister (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There have been celebrations across the nation when it was announced this morning that an overwhelming majority of Australians support marriage equality. Australians have confirmed their commitment to equality. They have voted no to discrimination, and it is part of the best of Australia's traditions of inclusion and equality. Today I am truly proud to be an Australian, and I imagine that across the world the example provided by Australians is producing great joy and a source of great hope for people who are interested in progressing human rights, fairness and equality.

I'd like to congratulate the many campaigners across Australia who gave their time and commitment to make this a reality. An army of volunteers were out every weekend, knocking on doors and making phone calls. I know that for many of those people this wasn't just any political campaign; this was a very personal campaign about themselves, their family and their future. Despite how personal this was and how difficult this must have been for some of those people, they campaigned with dignity, optimism and good humour, and they are deserving of all of our congratulations for the way they conducted themselves.

I also know that today's result for many LGBTI people is also an occasion for relief, that when the Australian people were asked to vote on their human rights—when they were asked to adjudicate on their dignity—the Australian people voted for equality. We should acknowledge that the last few months have been a testing time and a hurtful period for many people and their families. The LGBTI community were forced to justify their worth, while the ABS undertook an eye-wateringly expensive exercise to report what dozens of pollsters and plain common sense had told us already. We've now arrived at the point we should have been at well over a year ago: we're on the cusp of debating and voting on a bill to bring marriage equality into effect in Australia. The Prime Minister has built up expectations about this moment for some time. We've heard again and again that, if the country votes yes, we can expect marriage equality to be law by Christmas.

The country has voted yes, overwhelmingly so, and the results speak for themselves: more than 70 per cent participation for every demographic group and an especially high participation rate for our very youngest and oldest electors—those aged 18 to 19 years and those aged 85 years and over. We had an overall participation rate of almost 80 per cent, and more than 61.6 per cent voted in favour of legalising marriage equality. This is the most popular proposition formally put to the Australian people in 40 years. You have to go back to the 1977 referendum on term limits for High Court judges to find a proposal that was supported by every state and territory and with a margin of this magnitude. The raw numbers in support of change are staggering: 2.37 million people in New South Wales, 2.14 million people in Victoria, 1.48 million people in Queensland, almost 600,000 people in South Australia, more than 800,000 people in Western Australia, more than 191,000 people in Tasmania, 48,000 people in the Northern Territory and 175,000 people in the ACT. Despite what we're told, this support was not concentrated in a few inner-city seats. In fact, the constituents of some very prominent no advocates also voted in favour of equality. In the electorate of Menzies, for instance, 57 per cent voted yes. In fact, many of these electorates had yes votes which were above the national average. In the former Prime Minister's electorate of Warringah, 75 per cent voted yes. In the Minister for Immigration's electorate of Dickson, 65.2 per cent voted yes.

Let's be very clear about what this means. It constitutes a resounding nationwide endorsement for change. There is no mandate in these results for any group to play a frustrating role. These results do not give licence for representatives in this place to play procedural games or in any way attempt to stymie the process of legislating marriage equality. The Australian people have spoken. It's time for us in this chamber to listen.

In September this year, the Prime Minister told a marriage equality rally in Sydney that legislation in the form of a private member's bill would sail through the parliament by the end of the year if the yes vote succeeds. That was the promise, and now is the time to make sure that the debate on same-sex marriage legislation is brought on swiftly and fairly. This issue has been subject to lengthy debate here and in the other place. The arguments around this issue have been well canvassed and they are well understood by participants here in this chamber and also by the community. Swift passage is indeed what people have been promised. Senator Brandis, at the start of this campaign, told Leigh Sales on 7.30 that the Prime Minister had said that, in the event that there is a yes vote in the plebiscite, he will facilitate a parliamentary vote on a bill to reform the Marriage Act before Christmas. Well, now is that time to facilitate it. When he tried to justify his decision to stick to a plebiscite rather than progressing to a free parliamentary vote, Mr Turnbull said: 'Strong leaders carry out their promises. Weak leaders break them.' Well, the Australian people are now 'on a promise'. LGBTI people are 'on a promise'. The promise was that if we endured this postal survey, if we put our case publicly, if those who were in support of the yes campaign were able to convince the Australian people to vote yes in this survey, the swift passage of a change in legislation would be assured.

And all that's required is a change of legislation to allow two people who love one another to marry. We don't need to debate other questions. We don't need to open up long-settled questions about whether it's acceptable to discriminate against people in a whole range of areas. We simply need to progress with sensible measures, as was promised to the Australian people, to make marriage equality a reality. It is incumbent on every one of us in this place to keep that promise. While it was a promise made by members of the government, not my party, this was a process that, in the end, we all agreed to participate in. We all said: 'It's happening. We are going to do our best to get a valid and reasonable result, a legitimate result'—and that has happened. Given that that has taken place, there should be no justification for time wasting, no justification for game playing. It is simply time for everybody to settle down with the business of the parliament. We have been put here to legislate. We understand the arguments, we understand what's at stake and now we understand, with some certainty, the position of the Australian people. It is no time for delay. It is no time for games. It is time to get this done.

Richard Di Natale (Victoria, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also rise to make a short statement in response to the announcement of the results from the postal ballot asking the Australian people if they support a change to the Marriage Act. Today we've heard a resounding yes result from the Australian people in favour of change. Every state and territory has returned a yes result. Every electorate in Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania, the Northern Territory and the ACT has returned a yes result. Twenty-seven out of 30 electorates in Queensland say yes. The highest yes vote in my home state of Victoria included results of over 71 per cent in Batman, 70 per cent in Wills, 82 per cent in Melbourne Ports and 83.7 per cent in Melbourne, all areas with strong Greens campaigns. Even in New South Wales, we saw Warringah with a yes vote of 75 per cent. They didn't buy Tony Abbott's lie that this was about political correctness. They knew what this was about.

We've heard that, despite the negativity, the lies and the misleading tactics of the no campaign, the majority of Australians know that love is love. While we should never have put this question of human rights to a popular survey, we've heard once and for all from the yes result that it's time for this parliament to take the next step—to make equal love a reality for those thousands and thousands of people in LGBTIQ communities right across the country. People have waited so long—they have watched as country after country has gone before us to make this change. I don't often quote musicians, but I quote the Bronski Beat singer and long-time queer-rights campaigner Jimmy Somerville when he sings:

Read my lips and they will tell you

Enough is enough is enough.

Enough of the stalling; enough of the confusion; enough of the damaging homophobic lies. The result today is yes. I say to my Senate colleagues in the chamber: this shouldn't come as a surprise. A decade of solid opinion polls on this subject have shown deep support right across the community. It's now time for action.

Today I proudly stand in this chamber wearing rainbow sneakers given to me as a gift. I want to tell you a little story about these sneakers. I was passing the St Mark's Uniting Church near my office in the Melbourne CBD and I saw a giant yes banner being displayed outside. So I made inquiries and found out what was happening inside that congregation. I met the Rev. Ric Holland. He was a larger-than-life character, proudly advocating to his congregation and to the surrounding community that love is love and that marriage should be a fundamental right enjoyed by everyone in our community. I noticed that in his office he had a pair of bright, rainbow-coloured sneakers, and he told me that his daughter had made them specially for the campaign. A few days later, I received a pair of sneakers at my office as a gift from Primrose, and I wear them today for three reasons. I wear them to bring the rainbow colours into this chamber as a show of solidarity with the people from LGBTIQ communities. I wear them to remind us that the support for yes and for a change to the Marriage Act comes from all corners of the Australian community, including from faith communities. And I wear them to take inspiration from the change that we're creating with LGBTIQ communities to go on and work harder for change with other communities—with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people; for safety and equality for women; for an end to the stigma and discrimination experienced by people with disabilities; for an end to racism, wherever it rears its ugly head; for a safe refuge and new life for people escaping war and violence; for an end to poverty; for the protection of nature in our precious places; and for action on global warming. There is so much hard work to do. We have to keep pounding the pavement. When in the future I recall a yes vote and look at these sneakers, I'll know that change is possible. It was only a few short years ago that this was a debate that existed outside of this chamber, but a long way from this place. I'll think of those famous words from Arundhati Roy:

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.

Thank you, Primrose, for your inspiring rainbows. They have a special place in my heart.

I want to acknowledge and thank all those people who were part of the movement for change and who voted with their hearts for yes. I want to acknowledge the contribution of so many incredible people and organisations who made today's result possible. I want to acknowledge the thousands of couples across the country who have shared their stories of love and commitment and hope for equality to their families, their neighbours, their neighbourhoods and indeed, in this age of social media, right across the world. And the world today is listening.

Thank you to the two Victorian couples—Jacqui Tomlins and Sarah Nicholls, and Jason and Adrian Tuazon-McCheyne—who have been fighting for this since 2004. Thirteen years ago they sought to have overseas same-sex marriages recognised in Australia. The Howard government back then wasn't having a bar of it, and for the 13 years since they've continued to fight tirelessly for marriage equality.

Thank you to Rainbow Families, to just.equal, Australian Marriage Equality, PFLAG and the Human Rights Law Centre, who not only have been campaigning for marriage equality for many years but also led the High Court challenge to try to stop the damaging postal survey. There are numerous other organisations, including unions, Equal Love, states' AIDS councils and GetUp!, who have worked so hard for so many years to get to this point today.

Thank you to everyone across Australia who attended doorknocks, calling parties and rallies; who spoke to their friends, their families; who had those important conversations; and who were active in their local communities about the importance of saying yes. One million phone calls were made, 100,000 doors were knocked on and five million flyers were handed out. Thank you to our own supporters and volunteers in queer Greens groups around the country, who contributed hundreds of hours over the last few months to make sure we saw a yes result. Thank you to fellow parliamentarians and members of parties across the political spectrum who are supporting change. Thank you to those Greens colleagues who have gone before me, including Bob Brown and Christine Milne, and thank you to my current Greens team. I am so proud to be a member of a party where our track record is every MP, every vote, every time for marriage equality.

Today we find ourselves at the beginning of what I believe is the end of the fight for equality in marriage, but we all know there's some way to go yet. There will be some twists and turns as some on the no side seek to delay and derail the process. They'll use this as a Trojan Horse to try to entrench discrimination, rather than to remove it. But today we won't spend time dwelling on their negativity. We'll take time to celebrate the resounding yes vote. Today's a time for joy, for happiness, for love. Tomorrow, we'll come back to begin the debate in this chamber again on how to deliver the promise of a fairer, more inclusive Australia. Tomorrow, we must all recommit to the yes campaign to see through this final chapter. Our work is not yet done. We need the voices of the LGBTIQ communities and their many allies and supporters; we need to hear from them to remain steadfast, strong and loud. For yes to win we need to remain active and mobilised.

We will never turn back. We now have an opportunity to consign these exclusive, discriminatory, shameful laws to the dustbin and to usher in a more compassionate and inclusive era in our nation's history; to tell a different story about ourselves and who we are; to act now not just for us but for future generations, for our children who will no longer need to experience the discrimination and hate that so many before them have had to experience. Today we say yes to equality; we say yes to love.