Newspoll shows yes vote has firm lead in marriage equality survey

The yes vote has a commanding lead among people who have already voted in the marriage law postal survey, leading 59% to 38%, according to the latest Newspoll.

The Newspoll result shows the no campaign has slightly narrowed the gap with supporters of same-sex marriage but the yes campaign is on track to record a win in the survey, which will conclude on 7 November.

The result is consistent with all public polls since the postal survey campaign began, which have shown support for marriage equality ranging from 55% to 61% and opposition ranging from 32% to 39%.

On Tuesday the Labor caucus resolved to push for the cross-party Senate bill, drafted by Liberal senator Dean Smith, to be used to legislate marriage equality as soon as possible if the yes vote wins.

The move clears the way for Labor to push a bill through the Senate as early as the week of 15 November, when the Australian Bureau of Statistics announces the result, although the opposition claims it is not pre-empting the result.

John Howard has seized on Labor’s decision, telling the Australian it is an “added reason” to vote no because further exemptions to discrimination law to protect what he called religious freedom are unlikely.

He predicted if the yes vote wins there “will be enormous pressure to get behind the Smith bill because [it has] come from a Liberal backbencher and the Labor party and the Greens will back it”.

Newspoll found that 65% of respondents said they had already voted, with a further 19% saying they will “definitely” vote and another 6% saying they “probably will” vote.

Turnout was strongest among over 65s (74%) and Australians aged 50 to 64 (71%). That compares with a turnout of only 57% among those aged 18 to 34 and 63% among those aged 35 to 49.

The Newspoll of 1,583 respondents has a margin of error of 2.5%.

On Tuesday a YouGov poll found that, among those that have already voted, 61% say they voted yes, while 35% say no.

Responding to the Newspoll result on Channel Nine’s Today program on Wednesday, Malcolm Turnbull said that he would be “delighted” if there was a yes vote in the survey.

On Tuesday the ABS revealed that, as of Friday, 67.5% of Australians had returned their survey forms.

Turnbull said the fact that turnout was likely to top 70% was an “extraordinary” result that he claimed indicated that Australians “are embracing this survey”.

“That will prove that we were right, Australians did want to have their say and they’re having their say,” he said.

Despite the claim, the Newspoll found that support for the survey had declined from 49% in August to 44% in September to 43% last weekend.