The Equality Campaign has welcomed the announcement by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) today that almost three quarters (74.5%) of Australians have returned their marriage surveys.

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The ABS has released the latest return estimates from the 16 million survey forms sent out last month. The ABS said the estimate is based on a count of forms scanned rather than earlier estimates that were based on the weight of the bulk containers.

With only four days remaining until the recommended deadline to get the forms back, the ABS has confirmed that 74.5% have returned their surveys with 300,000 over the past week.

Speaking in Brisbane today, Equality Campaign Director Tiernan Brady said the high turnout showed that Australians wanted the issue dealt with as quickly as possible.

“Today’s result shows that Australians clearly want this issue to be dealt with as quickly as possible. We hope that a strong YES result will encourage Parliament to ensure marriage equality is a reality in Australia by Christmas.

“To be sure that their votes will be counted by the ABS, Australians should make sure they have posted their YES votes by this Friday 27 October,” Brady said.

The Equality Campaign’s Queensland Field Director, Nita Green, echoed Tiernan Brady’s message saying that there had been a groundswell of support for marriage equality in the conservative state.

“It is important that all Australians have their say. We have seen a great groundswell of support for YES in Queensland, and continue to ask supporters to speak to their friends, families and colleagues about voting before it’s too late.

“We welcome the high turnout of voters. It shows that Australians are passionate about the important issue of marriage equality throughout the country,” Green said.

Australian Olympic swimmers, Emily Seebohm and Mitch Larkin, today joined the Equality Campaign to welcome the positive results and encourage Australians to return their YES votes before it’s too late.

“It has been exciting to be a part of the positive conversations that are happening around the country about giving all Australians a fair go through marriage equality.” Seebohm said.

”We can only guarantee equality by sending a strong YES result to politicians which means all our supporters need to post their YES votes as soon as possible, and definitely by this Friday, 27 October.

“We can’t be complacent in these final days and I urge Australians to post their YES to be counted in support of our LGBT teammates, friends and family to achieve equality under the law,” Seebohm concluded.

Fellow Olympic swimmer Mitch Larkin encouraged everyone who has yet to post back their survey form to do so before the end of the week.

“It is clear that Australians want to have their say about fairness in this country. It is great to see that so many people have returned their survey forms, but there are still millions of votes that haven’t yet been posted.

“Marriage equality is about giving all Australians the opportunity to get married in our country and we can only do this by posting our YES votes before Friday,” Larkin said.

ABS deputy Australian statistician and taskforce lead, Jonathan Palmer, has also encouraged people to who have yet to return the form to make the effort.

“We’d like to ensure we have the highest participation rate possible for this voluntary survey,” Palmer said.

“We strongly recommend that you post back your completed forms straight away and certainly no later than 27 October to make sure you have your say.”

The ABS will accept forms until November 7th, but to make their cut off it is recommended that they are posted by Friday. The results will be announced on November 15th.

OIP Staff