Equality bulletin #69

This Equality bulletin was released by the TGLRG on 21.11.07.

Hi Everyone,

This Equality Bulletin is about LGBT issues in the 2007 federal election.

There are links to party policy statements, policy score cards put together
by community groups, and a Senate voting guide.

Below that, there is a summary of some LGBT election issues specific to
Tasmania.

Rodney Croome
0409 010 668

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Election 07
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Three organisations have solicited, rated and published the LGBT policies of
parties contesting Saturday’s federal election.

They are the Australian Coalition for Equality, the Victorian Gay and
Lesbian Rights Lobby and the NSW Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby.

To find out what the parties’ policies are, and how they rate, visit the
election webpages especially established by these three organisations.

They are

www.movingforward.org.au
www.vglrl.org.au
www.glrl.org.au/election07

The Coalition for Equality has also produced a guide to the flow of
preferences in the Senate. This will help LGBT voters better decide how to
vote for equality on their Upper House ballot papers.

For an explanation of the guide visit
www.rodneycroome.id.au/other_more?id=2552_0_2_0_M18

For the guide itself visit
http://coalitionforequality.org.au/election2007/guide.pdf

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Election 07 (in Tasmania)
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The Tasmanian Gay and Lesbian Rights Group did not conduct its own federal
election survey this year. But some matters emerged of specific interest to
LGBT Tasmanians.

a) Forums

The TGLRG conducted two election forums, one in Hobart and one in
Launceston. The Hobart forum was addressed by representatives of the Labor,
Liberal, Green, Socialist Alliance and What Women Want parties. The
Launceston forum was addressed by the same parties with the exception of the
Liberal Party.

At the Hobart forum Duncan Kerr (Labor, Denison) said he will work hard to
ensure Labor’s policy on same-sex couples is implemented. Vanessa Goodwin
(Liberal, Frankiln) said she will work to ensure her Party’s LGBT policies
are more progressive. Deb Casham (WWW, Senate) spoke of her party’s
commitment to freedom of choice and her personal experiences supporting LGBT
people. Andrew Wilkie (Greens, Senate) and Matt Holloway (SA, Denison) gave
details of their parties’ policy commitments.

b) Entitlements for Mersey Hospital employees

Neither major-party candidate in the seat of Braddon (Liberal Mark Baker or
Labor's Peter Sidebottom) responded to letters from the TGLRG expressing
concern that employees of the Mersey Hospital in same-sex relationships will
lose relationship entitlements in areas like superannuation if and when
their hospital shifts from state to federal control.

However, Labor’s policy is to reform national laws so there is no disparity,
and, soon after concern about this issue was aired, the Liberals announced
support for removing some discrimination in federal public sector
superannuation.

The Greens' policy is also to eliminate discrimination in federal law.
Braddon candidate, Paul O'Halloran, responded to the TGLRG's concerns with a
commitment to champion the rights of the affected employees.

c) Relationship registry

Despite claims by some anti-gay groups that a re-elected Coalition
Government would override state relationship registries, including
Tasmania’s, the Liberal Party gave the TGLRG an unqualified, written
assurance that this will not happen.

Of all the parties, the Labor Party has the strongest stated commitment to
the recognition of Tasmanian registered relationships in those federal laws
which grant relationship rights. This is consistent with Labor’s commitment
to enact nationally-consistent, state-based registries on the Tasmanian
model.

d) Incitement to hatred

At the start of the election campaign the TGLRG invited representatives of
the Green, Labor and Liberal Parties to sign a pledge against inciting
anti-LGBT hatred in their election material.

Duncan Kerr signed on behalf of Labor and Andrew Wilkie for the Greens. The
Liberals refused to allow their candidates to sign.

In the second last week of the election campaign the Liberal Party began
distributing anti-Green election leaflets which declared same-sex marriage
extremely harmful and dangerous, and associating it with the universal
symbol of poison and death, the skull and cross bones.

This leaflet has since been the subject of several complaints to the
Anti-Discrimination Commissioner.

Several candidates have spoken out against this election hate, including Ben
Quin (Independent, Lyons), Andrew Wilkie, Deb Casham and Matt Holloway.

e) Candidate statements

The TGLRG did not seek candidate statements. However one candidate offered a
statement for distribution.

He was independent, progressive-Catholic, anti-Family-First, Senate
candidate, Dino Ottavi.

His statement can be read at
http://tglrg.org/more/319_0_1_0_M/

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Authorised by Rodney Croome, Rm 20, Lvl 1, McDougall Bdg, Ellerslie Rd,
Battery Point, Tas., 7004.