“Be decent for once!” – Tirade at Comedian’s Voice

Rove McManus made an impassioned appeal to Australians to “have good decency” and vote “yes” in the referendum on voting in Parliament.

Millions of Australians will cast their votes on Saturday and vote for or against the inclusion of an advisory body for Australian Aboriginal peoples in the constitution.

The comedian revealed to The Project panel that he “got angry” at a meeting on Friday and that The Voice was “rigged.”

“Peter Dutton can simply say that it has not been explained properly and that we do not have a convincing argument. There are,” he said.

It is hoped that the Voice will give First Nations people, whose life expectancy is eight years shorter than that of other Australians and whose suicide rate is twice as high, a say in laws that affect them.

Mr McManus then revealed, after speaking to his nine-year-old daughter, what he found “mind-boggling” about those who wanted to vote no.

“She said, ‘I can’t believe anyone would vote against this,’ and that breaks my heart,” he said.

“What are we doing to ourselves? This is a real moment where we can be proud and show what a wonderful country this is.”

The three-time Gold Logie Award winner also addressed those who criticised The Voice for not addressing the issues facing Indigenous Australia far enough, saying: “In many ways, of course, it doesn’t.”

“You can’t just fall to the top of Mount Everest, you have to climb slowly and that’s the only way you can do it,” he said.

He urged Australians to think about how they wanted to vote and “just be decent for once” to bring about change among First Nations.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also made an emotional appeal to voters on Friday, saying that “kindness costs nothing.”

“It costs Australians nothing to show kindness and think with their hearts and their minds when they go to the polling booth tomorrow,” Albanese said.

“This is a time when Australians have an opportunity to show the generosity that I see in the Australian character,” he told reporters in Adelaide.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton used the last day before the election to warn that the proposed advisory body would represent “a very significant and detrimental change to our system of government”.

“I think there is a lot of regret about the division that has been created, the money that has been spent and the lack of practical results for Aboriginal Australians,” he told ABC radio.