Special Minister of State Scott Ryan
Policy options for conducting a postal vote for the same-sex marriage plebiscite went so far as being prepared for cabinet discussion by the Department of Finance for Special Minister of State Scott Ryan, documents obtained by Crikey reveal.
In March, Fairfax reported that Immigration Minister Peter Dutton — an opponent of marriage equality — had been working behind the scenes with fellow opponent and Finance Minister Mathias Cormann for a non-binding, non-compulsory postal vote on the issue in order to get the matter dealt with and uphold the Coalition’s promise to hold a plebiscite without the need to pass legislation it can’t get passed in the Senate.
Legislation is required to make the plebiscite compulsory and impose fines on Australians who do not vote, as per regular elections.
Crikey sought access to documents related to this proposal under freedom of information laws from the Department of Finance, which was believed to be working on the proposal, but several emails from March 21 and 22 this year — around the same time as Fairfax’s report — with documents attached were blocked from release. The department said in its decision that the documents in the emails were “ministerial submissions” for the purpose of briefing Special Minister of State Scott Ryan, and were proposed by Ryan “to be submitted to Cabinet for its consideration”.
“In particular the documents were intended to inform the minister on certain matters which were proposed, at the time, to be the subject of discussion with the Cabinet, the existence of which have not been officially disclosed.”
What the department was prepared to release, however, was one redacted email about the memorandum of understanding between the Commonwealth and the AEC regarding the 2007 postal vote plebiscite for local government amalgamations in Queensland.
Another email that was re-circulated in the department earlier this year but was first sent in 2015 from AEC chief legal officer Paul Pirani to legal academic Professor George Williams outlined what a postal vote would entail. He asked that this not be considered “the official view of the AEC” but said that aside from making the voting compulsory, he saw no barrier to the AEC conducting a postal plebiscite on the matter, in the way it conducts commercial for-fee votes for private businesses. He also said he didn’t see any potential constitutional issues in an agency allocating funds to conduct such a poll without legislation being passed first.
Liberal Senator Dean Smith has said he is drafting a private member’s bill to pass marriage equality without the plebiscite, and he will bring it for debate in the Liberal party room in the next few months and could push for a vote in parliament on the issue as soon as August. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has repeatedly talked down the prospect of the matter coming up for a vote without a plebiscite first happening, but it is possible that some Liberal backbenchers could cross the floor in the House of Representatives to bring the matter on for debate and vote with Labor and crossbench support. A snap postal plebiscite might be one way the government seeks to avoid this scenario and also gets the issue off the agenda before the end of the year.
If this goes ahead it will cost the Australian taxpayers a fortune in processing this plebiscite. The fact that if the result is for same sex marriage there is still no guarantee that legislation will be passed. This is an absolute disgrace and this legislation should be passed in parliament. We are one of the few western countries that still refuse to pass a law allowing same sex marriage. Woeful government.
Liberals, Nationals and The Religious Right cannot be trusted. Surely this is amply clear!. Vote Labor.
“In March, Fairfax reported that Immigration Minister Peter Dutton — an opponent of marriage equality — had been working behind the scenes with fellow opponent and Finance Minister Mathias Cormann for a non-binding, non-compulsory postal vote …”
Non-binding! Non-compulsory! No cost either?
Just in the last fortnight Germany and Malta have had their parliaments vote on this issue. In Germany Chancellor Merkel announced a conscience vote of Bundestag members and it passed within a week of the announcement although Merkel did not support it nor vote for it. Malta is a dominantly Catholic country but their parliament voted 66 to 1 in favour of the change.
This LNP government is beyond stupid. Look and learn guys! Understanding why you are dropping in the poll is not rocket science.
Malta managed to do it with only one no vote in its parliament and importantly also passed legislation criminalising “conversion therapy”.
Can we stop referring to this “non-binding, non-compulsory postal vote” as “plebicite”?
A plebicite is generally defined as being a vote by all of the electorate on a matter. What is being proposed is a self-selecting opinion poll that would have less statistical validity than the regular Newspoll or Essential polls we receive every couple of weeks.
Calling the postal thing a “plebicite” is like referring to North Korea as a “single party democracy”.
This postal vote plebiscite is merely a ploy to raise money for Australia Post. It isn’t going to move the discussion forward nor make it more civil. The Liberal Party’s insistence that we have a non-binding plebiscite because they used it as a election sop to their own religious fanatics doesn’t mean that they have any intention of acting on the finding. If I send in my vote without a stamp on it, will the Commonwealth pay the double postage fee. Those GST returns sent quarterly to ATO must raise a bundle.
Can we stop referring to this “non-binding, non-compulsory postal vote” as “plebicite”?
Why ? I’d argue that’s exactly how it should be referred to all the time to drive home the simple fact that any plebiscite is inherently non-binding, and almost certainly will be non-compulsory as well.
They already have their “plebiscite” right here: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-06-22/election-2016-vote-compass-same-sex-marriage/7520478
Weak arsed bunch of pricks CBF earning the money they make to do the right thing…
The only point of a plebicite is to palpably demonstrate to the hold-out LNP delusionals that the public really want marriage equality. The LNP wets need this written on stone in order to allow them to move forward on the issue. Anything less would allow the crazy right-wing to dig their heels in, particularly the Nationals.
As this is a nasty little LNP problem of their own making, Labor and the Greens are in no way obliged to assist them in untangling their mess.
No, the main point of the so called plebiscite is to harass GLBTI people yet again and bully them for the entertainment of the religious nut jobs, including those in government. Any deaths this causes would be seen as a bonus by them.
Given that noone else in the community is forced to have a plebiscite to beg for equal rights, this mechanism in and of itself constitutes a hate crime.
(Aboriginals were shamefully required to do this but there was a historic, if wrong, constitutional reason requiring this. The government of the day did not impose it.)
Indeed – for the duration of the campaign leading up to the plebiscite it will give the No case several weeks of taxpayer-funded gay bashing.
The plebiscite is a huge stalling tactic. It will be worded in such a way to ensure a “no” vote, just as Howard did with the republic vote.
There are three law changes which have overwhelming support from the community which the government of the day refuse to countenance -euthanasia, equal marriage and, less certainly (I haven’t seen a poll for years, as it is so off-agenda) capital punishment.
The first two have similar lawfare issues – a married, same sex couple with full legal rights could be framed as ‘slippery slope/floodgates’ invitation to have the state attack bakers, butchers & candlestick (buggy whip?) makers who did not want the pink dollar.
Does anyone imagine that bigots will be less apoplectic about the legally married sodomite/sapphist couple next door, in the pub or P&C meeting?
It would be worse that being of the tinted persuasion.
We have heard all the usual suspects rant & rail against BigGov intrusion from tobacco through seat belts to fluoride/HPV vaccination so this could be seen as the last stand, apre ce le deluge, of the righteous.
The lawfare implications of euthanasia go beyond the dreams of lawyer avarice – what constitutes free will/coercion?.