Same-sex marriage: Pretend to back Yes, Labor senator Helen Polley told
Bill Shorten at a doorstop in Launceston with Senator Helen Polley.
A Labor senator who is opposed to same-sex marriage says she has been urged by senior MPs and members of the ALP’s organisational wing to pretend to be in favour of changing the Marriage Act.
Tasmanian senator Helen Polley told The Australian she was maligned in the party because of her views and had been told she would cost Labor votes at the next federal election because she was opposed to gay marriage.
Senator Polley, a Catholic and a No voter in Malcolm Turnbull’s $122 million postal survey, said senior party figures had told her to change her position publicly even though it would go against her conscience. She would not name the people who told her to change her position, but said they were senior federal MPs and leading figures in the Tasmanian organisation.
“I’ve been told that I could be responsible for losing the next federal election,” she said.
