“It almost feels like there has been a shift in momentum, I have handed out a lot of flyers at Adelaide Railway Station and this morning there’s never been so many people taking the flyers saying they will be voting Yes,” Attorney-General Kyam Maher said.

“The level of positivity seems different. I think people are turning their minds to this now, I think the majority of people had not considered this in depth… and I think the better side of humanity in people is coming out.”

Maher was also “pleasantly surprised” to speak about the referendum to a packed hall in Victor Harbor last night that was mostly behind the Yes vote.

And he described a simple interaction this morning as one that stands out as among the most uplifting moments during campaigning.

“One woman took a flyer at the train station and she looked up at me with a big smile and she said ‘don’t worry, we’ve got this’, that was a hugely uplifting moment,” Maher said.

Another being the thousands of people gathering in Adelaide’s Victoria Square to support the Yes vote, where Maher stood alongside Elders wearing t-shirts with “Yes” written in Pitjantjatjara, Arabana and Adnyamathanha.

In contrast, Maher singled out disrespectful conduct and vitriol emerging from both sides of the debate as the most disappointing aspect of the referendum process.

A furore was triggered by protesters on Monday abusing No campaign supporters as they arrived at an Adelaide Convention Centre rally.

Prominent No campaign leader and federal Opposition spokesperson for Indigenous Affairs Jacinta Nampijinpa Price spoke at the event, describing herself as a “vessel” for Indigenous people ignored by mainstream politics and media who she believed would also be ignored by the Voice to Parliament.

Price was elevated to the Indigenous Affairs portfolio after Liberal MP Julian Leeser resigned as shadow attorney general and shadow minister for Indigenous Australians to campaign for a Yes vote in the referendum, to be held on October 14.

Maher said the conduct of Yes protesters on Monday, and less publicly aired comments written behind the “safety of a keyboard” in social campaigns, “does not reflect how Australians conduct themselves usually”.

He says many comments do not reflect the fact that the nation’s 97 per cent non-indigenous population will decide on a referendum that polling has shown is supported by 80 per cent to 90 per cent of Indigenous Australians.

“I think there are a couple of very prominent voices in the No side who have been very active in putting forward their views,” he said.

Maher said Indigenous Australians have been continually recognised as having less advantage through Closing the Gap reports tabled year after year, and the Voice was a new way to tackle the issue.

“Data published four to five years ago shows a man living on the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands (APY) in South Australia has an average life expectancy of 48 years,” Maher said.

In August, Maher visited a tuberculosis clinic on the APY Lands where there were 13 confirmed cases of TB, “a disease largely eradicated around the globe”.

No matter how muddied the debate gets, Maher is focused on telling South Australians that “no one will lose anything” by recognising First Nations people and having an advisory board that provides advice on matters affecting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander lives.

“It will give recognition on the birth certificate of our nation, the constitution, a constitution that recognises coins and lighthouses, but has the glaring omission of not recognising the oldest living culture on the planet and its people,” he said.

And it will enact what 250 Aboriginal people representing communities across Australia have asked for through the Uluru Statement of the Heart, to have a Voice to Parliament.

“No one loses anything from that, no power is taken away from anybody else, Aboriginal people get a little bit more of a say about things that happen in their lives,” Maher said.

“It’s much easier to argue against something to scare people… it seems the No campaign talks about everything but what this referendum is about, recognition in the Constitution and a voice.”