ANU experts discuss Marriage Law Postal Survey results

ANU experts have given their opinion on today's historic Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey result and its implications for Australia.
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Dr Liz Allen, Demographer, ANU Centre for Social Research and Methods

"Despite a flawed process which advantaged the No campaign, Australians overwhelmingly participated and supported marriage equality."

"The result from the survey indicate strong participation across all age groups and states and territories with little exception."

"Given the participation rate we can be confident that the marriage law survey is a valid representation of what Australians want," Dr Allen said.

Dr Jill Sheppard, School of Politics and International Relations, ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences

"This shows the futility of the whole exercise, because we could have predicted this result from existing survey research."

"It is a strong and clear result which should clear a path for imminent legislation," Dr Sheppard said.

Dr Andrew Hughes, Research School of Management, College of Business & Economics

"There is nothing unexpected about the result but it does show a resounding victory to the Yes vote."

"The No vote can't be ignored either, 4.9 million people said no and you can't ignore 4.9 million people."

"The battle now moves into the Senate. We may even see a bill introduced as early as this afternoon, which would be based around Dean Smith's bill, to make marriage equality legal by Christmas," Dr Hughes said.

Professor Michael Platow, ANU Research School of Psychology
NOTE: Professor Platow has conducted a study interviewing 200 Yes voters and 200 No voters to get their perspectives on the respective campaigns

"Both sides see themselves as being more 'Australian' and more competent."

"What's interesting is that each side sees the other side as being more prejudiced, each side sees the other as being more sinful and less in favour of freedom of speech," Professor Platow said.

Simon Copland, PhD Candidate, School of Sociology

"This highlights huge community support for marriage equality among Australians."

"It shows how far we have come over the last ten years in terms of support for marriage equality and support in general for LGBTQI people."

"Public opinion has changed significantly on this issue and that has been shown today."

"We need a bill that gets passed as soon as possible, we want a clean bill that does not have the same sort of discrimination that has been embedded in the James Paterson bill."

"This needs to be passed by Christmas in a way that reduces discrimination rather than increases it," Mr Copland said.