MATTER OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE – MARRIAGE EQUALITY

Thank you Mr Speaker. 

Marriage equality is important, and it matters.

It’s not the biggest challenge Australia faces – and it’s not something that requires, however, a three-month campaign and $122 million optional survey.

We could be here, right now, voting for marriage equality as the elected representatives of the people of Australia.

Just as we do on national security, on Medicare, on education, on the matters that touch the lives of every citizen of our nation.

But this government has decided that gay people should be subject to a different law-making process.

They think same-sex couples should have to write to everyone else in this country for the permission to get married.

They think LGBTI Australians should have to ask permission to be considered equal…from Australians who will not even see the law they are casting an opinion on.

This is wrong – and it is a ridiculous waste of time and taxpayer money.

On Tuesday we remembered Dr G Yunupingu, who died of kidney disease. $122 million would fund dialysis in remote communities for decades.  

It’s National Homelessness Week: $122 million would provide 2000 new beds for people currently sleeping rough.

We could put 1900 new teachers in our schools, we could train 4500 new nurses.

We could help auto-workers find new jobs in new industries.

But because of his weakness, the Prime Minister is spending $122 million to try and save his own job.

That’s a direct quote – from the Prime Minister, back when he used to believe in something, before his ambitions seduced his ideals.

We have already seen the ugliness this debate holds for LGBTI Australians and their families.

Extremists are re-running their old smears against same-sex couples and their children.

The Member for Warringah is out there claiming this is a vote on ‘political correctness’ and ‘religious freedom’.

And the disgraced former Speaker Bronwyn Bishop has spoken about polygamy, bestiality and killing children with disability.

Every hateful ideological hobby-horse will be saddled up for this vote – and it is clear who is responsible.

In less than 48 hours the Prime Minister has gone from promising to call out extreme voices – to saying they’re entitled to their view.

He’s gone from guaranteeing ‘a respectful debate’ to saying ‘it’s up to individuals’.

He calls that ‘strong leadership’.

Strong leaders don’t need to say ‘I’m a strong leader’.

They prove it with their actions. By acting on their convictions, by fighting for what they believe in, even by taking a political risk.

Strong leaders lead – they don’t stand by and allow children of same-sex couples to be treated as pawns.

And yesterday, we learned that the Australian Electoral Rules won’t even apply to this vote.

No protection against:

-      ballot fraud

-      electoral bribery

-      intimidation

-      interfering with the electoral roll

-      publishing misleading and deceptive material.

Who can forget that pathetic red-faced public tantrum from the Prime Minister on election night, when he sooked about one text message?

Now he is giving his blessing to billboards, websites, pamphlets, TV advertising and online material. 

 It will vilify and demean LGBTI Australians and their children.

 

We know this bile will end up in the playground, the schoolyard and the sporting field. The slogans will be shouted at the children of same-sex couples.

 

Young people who are gay will be confronted by it on social media, every day.

 

Prime Minister, I loathe the trolls and the haters – but I expected more from him.

 

I hold you responsible, for every hurtful bit of filth that this debate will unleash.

 

Not because the Prime Minister has said it, not because he agrees to it. He clearly doesn't.

 

But because the Prime Minister has licensed this debate.

 

You are the leader, Mr Turnbull, you have given permission.

 

I will never hold you in the same light ever again.

 

I hold the Prime Minister responsible – and Australians will too. 

 

Mr Deputy Speaker

 

LGBTI Australians have every right to feel let down by their Parliament today.

 

Every right to consider this postal survey the latest in a long line of insults – I don’t blame them for that.

 

I can understand that an LGBTI person receiving a survey, with the Australian coat-of-arms on the corner of the envelope asking everyone else to decide if you are equal.

 

I wouldn’t blame you if you just wanted to just chuck that in the bin.

 

But let me say to you, that is what they want you to do.

 

The strongest supporters of this survey have always been the most vocal opponents of marriage equality.

 

They have stacked the deck against young people, against expats, against Australians who support equality but regard this vote as a waste of time.

 

The opponents of marriage equality have set this process up to fail. 

 

But we cannot let illegitimate tactics deter us, we cannot sit on the sidelines.

 

I understand the sense of frustration and betrayal by the Parliament for LGBTI Australians

 But the most powerful act of resistance and defiance is to vote yes for equality.

 

Maintain your hope, maintain your enthusiasm.

 

Vote yes and make sure that your friends and relatives and colleagues and classmates and teammates vote yes too.

 

Get your name on the electoral roll today, make your voice heard.

 

Voting yes is not about endorsing this illegitimate process, it’s about refusing to walk past our fellow Australians when they need us.

 

This is my message for business leaders, for sporting clubs, for the union movement, for community groups – it is time now to get involved.

 

It’s time to organise and fight for equality.

 

This survey is costly.

 

This survey is unnecessary.

 

This survey places unfair pressure on one group of Australians to justify their relationships.

 

This survey is a political contrivance from a Prime Minister who spends all his time counting Newspolls. 

 

This survey denies the parliament the chance to lead.

 

We didn’t need a survey to tell us to say Sorry – we led in this Parliament, we did the right thing, the community backed us.

 

This $122m poll denigrates the Parliament.

 

It risks putting Australia in a hell of a place, further behind the rest of the world.

 

But there is one thing this survey will not do.

 

It will not change Labor’s support for marriage equality.

If Prime Minister Turnbull stops marriage equality laws coming into this parliament, the men and women of the Federal Parliamentary Labor Party will vote for equality in overwhelming numbers. 

 

And if it is not resolved by the next election, a new Labor government will legislate to make marriage equality a reality within the first 100 days. 

 

No slew of discredited surveys will deter us. 

 

Parliament created these laws. 

 

It is time for parliament to amend them. 

 

We didn't have a survey for the other 20 changes to the Marriage Act and we do not need one now. 

 

The Prime Minister has abdicated responsibility for change.

 

He has declared himself too busy to campaign for it. 

 

But he is prepared to unleash this public farce on the citizens of Australia, but not prepared to take responsibility for its outcomes or its consequences.

 

In two years of a prime ministership defined by moral cowardice, this a new low.

 

But in the end, it is not even about what the Liberals or Nats or Labor think, it is about our fellow Australians. 

 

So my final message to LGBTI people is this, and it is a message to their parents and their siblings and their children and everyone who loves them:

 

I know this has been a week of heartbreak following years of disappointment.

 

I know that some Liberals worked hard not to have this outcome and I respect them for that. 

 

I know LGBTI Australians are frustrated, they're angry, they're sad and they're bewildered that it has come to this.

 

But I want you to know, you are not alone. 

 

You are not alone in this fight ahead.

 

Over the next few months, terrible things will be said about you and your families, about your lives, your identities, your choices, and the Prime Minister will not stand up for you.

 

And I am sorry you have to endure this, but Labor will stand up for Australians. 

 

I give you this promise. We stand with you.

 

When you do not feel like you have a voice, we will speak up for you.

 

When you feel attacked, we will defend you.

 

When we hear prejudice and discrimination, we will not cross the road and pretend it is not happening, we will call it out. 

 

I will be voting yes.

 

I will be campaigning for a yes vote.

 

I will do my bit, and I encourage people to join the movement for marriage equality, because no true leader is every too busy to fight for a fair go in this country.

 

Equality is not a diary appointment you meet in three, six or eight months' time. 

 

We say to young Australians who are gay, we are voting in this survey, we are participating in this survey because of you.

 

Not because we respect the process, but because the Labor Party will not let gay Australians and young gay people cope with this survey, this evaluation of their relationships, on their own. 

 

I say to LGBTI Australians, while ever there is a Labor Party, you are never on your own.