The Turnbull government is looking at draft laws to ensure advocates on both sides of the same-sex marriage postal survey campaign don’t resort to “misleading” or “deceptive” conduct in advertising materials.
Survey forms will start to be mailed out by the Australian Bureau of Statistics from September 12 to all 16 million registered Australians after the High Court cleared the way for the survey to be held.
Voters will be asked: “Should the law be changed to allow same sex couples to marry?”
The government will over the weekend reach out to all stakeholders in the debate, including members of parliament and political parties, to put forward suggestions on what those safeguards should be.
Senator Cormann said the legislation will also ensure that the campaign process aligns with rules that would normally apply in the context of an election.
“When there are things like authorisation requirements so that everyone can clearly identify who is responsible for particular communication,” he added.
“There are in the Electoral Act provisions that deal with misleading and deceptive conduct. But that has been interpreted by the High Court in the past relating to misleading and deceptive communications that would get the voter to fill out the ballot paper in an erroneous way, in the main.
"We will explore to what extent it is sensible to put all of the safeguards in place that would normally apply in the context of a federal election.”
The government is aiming to pass the safeguard legislation by next week.
There have been several reports of offensive campaign material including from neo-Nazi groups involved in distributing homophobic posters.
Most recently the white power group Antipodean Resistance has been accused of issuing factually-incorrect posters throughout Melbourne.
Chinese-language flyers
Dr Pansy Lai, one of three mothers who appeared in a 'No' campaign ad, dismissed criticism of a flyer distributed by her Australian Chinese for Families Association - which is opposed to same-sex marriage and the Safe Schools program.
the group has had a positive response to the flyers from the Australian Chinese community.
The six-page Chinese language pamphlet, printed in large font, reads: "Redefining marriage will leave our society bearing severe consequences."
"We all deserve to know the real consequences of legalisation of same sex marriage."
"In countries where same sex marriage is legalised, employees could be fired by the government and big corporations after they expressed their personal belief that marriage is only between a man and a woman."
"Small businesses will be hit with lawsuits and struggle if they choose not to cater to same-sex weddings because of their personal religion."
The pamphlet also says the rights of same-sex marriage opponents will be threatened: "Same sex marriage advocates have shown that they don't care about others' equality".
'Strong protections needed'
Greens leader Richard Di Natale said his party would participate in discussions on the safeguard laws.
“We need to have the strongest possible protections for people who are going to be subjected to what's going to be, in some elements of the community, an awful campaign,” he said.
The final result of the survey will be announced by the Australian Statistician at 11.30am on November 15.
If the majority result is ‘Yes’, the government would put forward legislation to legalise gay marriage.
Former prime minister Tony Abbott said he will respect the people’s vote on the survey, and would “facilitate” the passage of a bill should the majority vote be ‘Yes’.
Senator Cormann also encouraged all those involved in campaigning for either the 'Yes' or 'No' cases to do so with "courtesy and respect", and encouraged all to have their say.
"And at the end of the process, the Australian parliament, I'm very confident, will respect the collective judgement of the Australian people."
