Text campaign slammed
THOUSANDS of Townsville residents have received unsolicited text messages urging them to vote “Yes” in the Australian marriage law postal survey.
The message reads: “The Marriage Equality Survey forms have arrived!
“Help make history and vote YES for a fairer Australia. Vote Yes. org. au”
The website implores people to pledge to vote yes and has links to frequently asked questions about the “Yes” campaign.
It also asks people if they have posted their Yes vote yet.
Townsville resident David Skinner was surprised to receive a text message and described it as “intimidation”.
“It’s as if we cannot make THE thousands of new jobs Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has taken credit for since the last election are mostly made up of the State and Federal Governments’ ballooning public service. More than three quarters of the state’s new jobs over the past 2 ½ years have gone to taxpayer- funded bureaucrats.
Federal Employment Minister Michaelia Cash accused Ms Palaszczuk of misleading Queenslanders by talking up the jobs figures, saying there had been a “minuscule increase in private sector jobs”.
Ms Cash said Queensland’s job creation was due to a “drastic increase in the size of the public service”. our own survey.
“It’s becoming more of a joke as the days roll past.”
He said the link to the website was broken when he tried to access it.
A spokesman for the Equality Campaign confirmed it sent thousands of text messages to “randomly generated” phone numbers.
“Our goal is to reach as many Australians as possible decisions on the and let them know this is about their neighbours and the respect and dignity of Australians,” an Equality Campaign spokesman said.
“The response has been overwhelmingly good and there have been massive signups.”
He could not say how much was spent on the text message campaign but said the “No” campaign hugely outspent the “Yes” campaign with back- to- back ads on prime time TV, believed to be worth $ 20,000 each.
“We’re airing once or twice. We’re getting spent out of the water and we have to be creative. Text messages are one way to do that.
“People have been getting robo- calls for a week.
“It’s the vocal minority that have responded. Overwhelmingly we’ve had a positive response.”
The spokesman said volunteers played a large part in the campaign, which also included doorknocking events in Townsville. Volunteers are also handing out flyers at shopping centres and holding community barbecues.
Marriage Equity director Tiernan Brady said it was an “incredibly important question”.
“This is about the dignity and value of a group of people in our country,” he said.
“We have a duty to give it everything we’ve got.”