Telstra Goes Public With Support For Marriage Equality, Again

It has been a hell of a month for Telstra.

Putting aside network outages and ‘free data days’, the telco faced a PR nightmare to end all PR nightmares last week when they said they would no longer be “active in the debate” on marriage equality.

(The Australian reported that Telstra had received a letter from the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney suggesting religious organisations would cancel their services if the company continued their public support for marriage equality. Telstra denied any pressure from the Catholic Church in their decision-making, however.)

The backlash was immense, with many users promising to cancel their own services as a result of the backflip, which is why CEO Andrew Penn has written a new statement indicating a second backflip. (Or, is this one a forward-flip? An unflip?)

“Telstra supports marriage equality,” he wrote.

“Last week we advised that out of respect for the individual our view had been that we would not add further to the debate on marriage equality ahead of a plebiscite or parliamentary debate. It is clear that rather than Telstra stepping back we should in fact step forward and support our view for marriage equality and so that is what we will do.”

Penn noted that he fully expects new backlash as a result of Telstra’s decision, but nonetheless, “it is the right thing to do.”

“By renewing our active position, we acknowledge that we are at equal risk of inflaming a new debate but it is the right thing to do. It also remains very important that we continue to recognise and respect the right of the individual to hold their own view on this issue.”

With a double dissolution seeming more and more likely, you can expect a new election and, likely, a plebiscite on marriage equality to follow soon after.

Meaning, expect a lot more public debate on the subject in the months to come. Brands, prepare yourselves.

Photo: iStock.