With the marriage equality postal vote deadline of August 24 looming, members of the UOW Labor Students Club and Illawarra Young Labor were out in force on Wednesday.
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Armed with computers and information pamphlets, they set about making sure their fellow University of Wollongong students had the opportunity to vote in the postal ballot on marriage equality.
Illawarra Young Labor secretary Caitlin Roodenrys said it was important students checked their enrolment details to ensure they were eligible to vote.
‘’That’s why we have computers here. People can get online and check their details. It only takes about five minutes,’’ she said.
The ex-president of the UOW Labor Club said UOW Labor Students and Illawarra Young Labor completely supported marriage equality, and was encouraging people to vote yes in the postal ballot.
‘’It is important to get out and get a yes vote on this because we want to be able to show those really conservative politicians that unfortunately we still have left in parliament, that this is what people want,’’ Miss Roodenrys said.
Most of the polls show that 70 per cent of Australians agree with marriage equality. Hopefully the yes vote prevails.
- Caitlin Roodenrys
‘’Most of the polls show that 70 per cent of Australians agree with marriage equality. Hopefully the yes vote prevails.
‘’My message to fellow students is to make sure your enrollment is up to date and when you get the ballot whenever it is, vote yes.’’
Fellow Illawarra Young Labor member Sam Noakes encouraged students to visit aec.gov.au/enrol or aec.gov.au/check before August 24.
‘’I’ve done it five times already to make sure I’m enrolled and can vote. It’s really easy, it only took a few minutes,’’ he said.
‘’I’d hate for students to miss out on the chance to vote because they are not enrolled or they haven’t updated their address.’’
In a statement to the Mercury, the UOW Allsorts Queer Collective said it is ‘’generally disappointed that the postal vote is going ahead but hopes the country will vote yes and are therefore excited for legitimate progress on marriage equality to occur’’.
‘’It is an especially intimidating time to be Queer in many complex ways due to media, political and national attention. We hope this will open a dialogue for more queer* issues to be taken seriously and be a step in the right direction toward humanizing and empowering transgender, intersex, asexual, bisexual, lesbian and gay Australians.’’
