ADDRESS TO RALLY FOR MARRIAGE EQUALITY

How fantastic it is to see a sea of people, across the political spectrum, united by one idea – it’s time for marriage equality.

 

I want to thank the organisers for today’s rally. I want to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land upon which me meet. I want to thank Tanya for her leadership in our party on this question.

 

There’s only three things I want to say today.

 

The first is an apology.

 

I am sorry that the Parliament has not already resolved this matter.

 

I am sorry for all of the hateful and stupid things which have been said, and are going to be said until we win marriage equality.

 

And I am sorry to all LGBTIQ Australians, because we have one more mountain to climb together. But we will climb it together.

 

My wife Chloe and I are here in solidarity, and I tell you, there will be many more people who after today will say they were here today, and there are millions who wish they were here today.

 

And this is the promise. I promise, and my party promises, that we will walk alongside LGBTIQ Australians from here until we get marriage equality.

 

We will walk alongside you. We will call out the rubbish. We will call out the hate. We will not go missing and cross on the other side of the road.

 

Wherever we see discrimination and prejudice, I promise you, you will never walk alone.

 

And I promise that we will deal with these false and misleading arguments, these arguments of straw men.

 

When we vote yes in this survey, we are not voting about the future of religion in this country.

 

We are not voting about whether or not you get to marriage a bridge. We are not voting about seatbelts. We are not voting about a whole lot of extraneous rubbish that you will hear.

 

I promise you, we will make this marriage survey about one question. One question – and this is the final thing I want to say to you.

 

What is the question?

 

The question is – do you support marriage equality in this country? Do you support it?

 

 

My word. My word, we support marriage equality.

 

And when I support marriage equality, I do so because I believe in family values.

 

I value all families – LGBTI Australians as well as all other families.

 

I live in a blended family. When they judge LGBTI Australians, and say somehow that is not a first-class family, or an appropriate family, I feel all families are judged.

 

It is hard to raise children. It is hard in a modern world to keep relationships together.

 

What this world needs, and what this country needs, is we need help to maintain families, we need help to raise children, and that is why we need marriage equality.

 

And when people say this survey is about identity, my word it’s about identity.

 

It’s about our identity as a nation. Do we believe in equal care for all, equal rights for all? That’s my identity.

 

We can win this thing. We can climb this mountain. We can participate in this survey. We can vote yes.

 

But in answer to all of these questions – why?

 

Because I believe, and I know everyone else here is united in the belief, that when our brothers and sisters, when our fathers and mothers, when our neighbours and colleagues are not treated equally, we are all diminished.

 

When you fill in this envelope in this survey, when you vote yes for marriage equality, you include all Australians.

 

And when we include all Australians, we are better Australians.

 

Thank you very much.