The atmosphere of the Melbourne rally had an air of a movement reuniting,with many attendees still agitated by vaccine mandates and other historical health measures enacted to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
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The group marched from parliament to Flinders Street Station,where protesters took turns to speak to the crowd and sing songs,including a lyrically reworked version of John Farnham’sYou’re The Voice –which has been usedby their opponents in the Yes campaign.
“It’s all just like COVID. That’s why we’re here because we smell the same rat,” said Mark Mack,who altered the first verse of Farnham’s lyrics to:“They’re trying to take the country over.”
The Sydney event,which was hosted ex-Howard government MP turned Liberal Democrat,Ross Cameron,began with a Welcome to Country by Aboriginal activistBruce Shillingsworth,who has been linked to the fringe Indigenous “Original Sovereigns”.
He urged the crowd to vote No to Voice,and praised them for standing up to the “evil regime here and around the world” and opposing a “dictatorship” which he did not identify.
NSW upper house MP John Ruddick,a member of the Liberal Democratswho worked with Boikov to organise the Sydney protest,told the crowd that the Voice would set up a “two class structure” in Australia. Ruddick took aim at federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton forproposing a second referendum on constitutional recognition.
“He wants to have another referendum. He’s not getting the message and he wants to set up regional voices,” said Ruddick,who is a former member of the Liberal Party.
The numbers were significantly lower than the tens of thousands of people who attendedYes rallies in Melbourne andSydney last weekend.
Earlier in the week,major No outfit Fair Australia said the anti-Voice rallies were “not supported,endorsed or funded by us in any way”. Federal Liberal frontbencher James Paterson urged No voters not to attend the events,condemning them as a “shameless” attempt to push “wacky and extreme causes”.
Speaking before the rallies started on Saturday,Communications Minister Michelle Rowland urged people to draw a contrast between No protests and the Yes marches last weekend.
“Australians should be aware that these No rallies are actually being organised by a bloke hiding in the Russian consulate in Sydney ... they should question the motivations in this regard and they should be invited to contrast this weekend’s activities with the positive message displayed last weekend,” Rowland said.
Campaigning in Ryde in northwest Sydney,Prime Minister Anthony Albanese drew on veteran singer Kamahl’sVoice U-turnas he spoke with shoppers at a shopping centre on Saturday morning.
“He’s someone who came out and said No and went away,spoke to people,read what it was about,read the question and decided that he would come out and declare his support for Yes,” Albanese said. “And to say why would anyone oppose this?”
“We have now a new term we’ve coined today:Kamahl-mentum.”
Meanwhile,Dutton addressed the Liberal Party’s Victorian state conference on Saturday,arguing that Albanese still had not answered simple questions about the Voice.
“I believe Australians on the 14th of October are going to stand up for what they believe in,” Dutton told Liberal Party members in Melbourne. “They’re going to support the position of the Liberal Party because they know that we’ve thought about it.”