What's the likely vote on same-sex marriage?

Fellow citizens,

While we won't know what the results from the same-sex marriage survey will be until November 15, there is enough data for us to make an estimate of what the likely result will be.

Women will be the key to this outcome, as I wrote on September 12 in a piece titled "On equal marriage sisters are doin' it for themselves...and everyone else"

Since August 22, Essential Research has published four reports on same-sex marriage and has found the support from women in favour as follows:

65%, 65%, 62%, 63% (average = 64%)

Whereas the support from men in favour was as follows:

48%, 52%, 47%, 52% (average = 50%)


As to the intention to vote, Essential Research published three reports prior to and just as the postal surveys had started to be mailed out and found that the percentage of women who said they would "definitely vote" as:

67%, 66%, 64% (average = 66%)

Whereas the percentage of men who said they would "definitely vote" as:

59%, 58%, 55% (average = 58%)

This ratio of the intended participation of women to men is consistent with the findings of Ipsos Research (published on September 12) which found 72% of women said they would "definitely return their survey form", as opposed to 59% of men.


Since the same-sex survey has been in full operation, Essential Research has found that 41% of women have reported that they have "already voted" as opposed to only 30% of men, illustrating that women are doing what they said they would do...as are the men.


What does this tell us?

That the gender most in favour of same-sex marriage is also the gender most likely to vote and therefore unless something quite extraordinary and unexpected occurs the same-sex marriage survey will be carried.


And the vote?

Using the estimates from Essential Research, if 64% of women and 50% of men vote YES, and 36% of women and 50% of men vote NO, then the total vote for YES would equal 57% and the vote for NO would equal 43%.


And then the difference in participation changes the result slightly.

Again using the estimates from Essential Research, if 66% of women and 58% of men participate in the survey, then the overall vote in favour of YES would increase to 58% and the vote in favour of NO would decrease to 42%.


Nothing, of course, is certain. However, there is enough recent and current evidence of intent and action from the women (and men) of Australia to lead me to conclude that the same-sex marriage survey will be carried comfortably.