The purpose of Together, Yes is to help achieve a strong YES vote for an Indigenous Voice to Parliament in the upcoming 2023 referendum. Together, Yes is generating a huge groundswell of support for an Indigenous Voice to Parliament by creating a first ever, nationwide ‘Kitchen Table Conversations’ (KTC) movement. This KTC model has been designed and used by the Victorian Women’s Trust for more than twenty years. Tried and tested, it arose from a powerfully simple idea: engaging people in respectful and honest dialogue creates real and lasting change.
Victorian Women’s Trust has adapted its KTC methodology in service to the national YES campaign with explicit consent and ongoing partnership work with the indigenous leadership team at Australians for Indigenous Constitutional Recognition. Together, Yes conversations will act as a counter and unifying force against wilful confusion, negativity and racism in the lead up to the referendum.
Since late March, the Together, Yes team has been travelling the country delivering community information sessions. By 11th May, we will have visited every state and territory and delivered 26 sessions. Our aim in these sessions is to recruit conversation hosts: people willing to gather up to 10 people together in a relaxed setting to have a conversation with materials provided by Together, Yes.
By the end of June 2023, we will have delivered a further 5 community information sessions, taking our total to 31 sessions. The additional sessions will be delivered in Burnie (TAS), Devonport (TAS), Gippsland (VIC), Western suburbs of Melbourne (VIC), and Rockingham (WA).
Our internal structures, resources and skilled people are in place so we are perfectly poised to deliver these additional sessions quickly and to a high standard.
At the sessions, we expect to meet between 250 - 350 people in person and recruit an additional 500 conversation hosts.
We will know we have successfully achieved our desired outcomes by tracking the number of people registering to attend each session, the number of people in attendance, and the number of registered conversation hosts.
The Together, Yes team has created a website where conversation hosts have their own password-protected portal. This is the main way that we will be communicating and supporting conversation hosts. In addition, conversation hosts will provide feedback to us about their discussion groups and share learnings and insights their groups have made. The learnings and updates we receive from conversation hosts will inform our wider messaging in the lead up to the referendum. We will also share this intelligence with the national YES campaign who will also use it to refine messaging closer to polling day.
At the conclusion of the project, the Together Yes team will conduct an internal reflection and evaluation of the project so that we can get a wholistic view of the projects reach, impact and outcomes.
Established in 1985, the Victorian Women’s Trust (VWT) is a proudly independent feminist organisation. We support women, girls and gender diverse people to thrive. We create social change projects and campaigns; conduct research on the issues affecting our communities; run thought-provoking events; provide mentorship opportunities; and give grants to vital grassroots projects. Our advocacy work focuses on three high impact areas: economic security, health and safety, and equal representation. Creating change in these areas is key to achieving true gender equality.
VWT is 100% powered by donations from people in the community who share our vision for an equal future for all.
Think lens, think glasses. Glasses correct limitations of vision and enable clearer sight. And so it is with a gender lens, which helps us to see more clearly the role gender plays in shaping our male and female lives, our work, experience and choices.
Also known as Australian Women Donors Network (ABN: 28 141 197 471), Australians Investing in Women is a registered charity endorsed by the Australian Tax Office as a deductible gift recipient (DGR1) under a special listing, all donations over $2 are tax deductible.