Page 3494 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 22 October 2014
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personal level I am really impressed with the leadership that you showed on this issue. Thank you. It meant a great deal to a large number of people in the community as well as their friends, partners and families and members.
I think that was a good step in the right direction for a large number of people—in actual fact, it is not a large number of people but that does not matter—in our community.
I will turn now to the issue of same-sex marriage. The first point I would make in response to the motion is that it does not acknowledge the fact—I notice Mr Rattenbury has circulated a similar amendment to the one I will be moving—that the High Court of Australia overturned the ACT legislation. I do not think you can have a motion talking about this issue without that element or fact in it. In fact the High Court judgement was definitive. It was unanimous. It said:
If a Commonwealth law is the complete statement of the law governing a particular relation or a thing, a territory law which seeks to govern some aspects of that relation or thing cannot operate concurrently with the federal law to any extent.
I think everybody in this place would be well aware of the High Court’s decision, which was, of course, definitive. I will be seeking leave to move amendments to the motion. Certainly one of those is simply to add into Ms Berry’s motion that the High Court ruled that marriage is legally and constitutionally a federal matter and cannot be legislated by the ACT. That is factual. I do not think that there would be any disagreement to that.
The point I would make, though, is that there is a range of diversity about same-sex marriage in our community. I recognise that there are strong advocates for it, and I recognise the position of those opposite who are strong advocates for same-sex marriage. But equally, in the community that I represent there are people who are very much for same-sex marriage; there are people who do not support it, for a range of reasons, including their faith. And I respect all of those views. I do.
From my point of view, I am broadly neutral on this issue. If it does come to pass that same-sex marriage is legislated in the commonwealth parliament, that would be of no concern to me. I am not advocating that. It is a federal matter and it is for my federal colleagues to determine. I note that you, Madam Assistant Speaker, are an advocate for same-sex marriage, a strong advocate for same-sex marriage, and I know that you do lobby your federal Liberal colleagues on this matter. I am open to that. Certainly in the Liberal Party, on my side, I am very open to all of our members expressing their view. But as you will recall, we did not vote for the legislation because we were told, based on the legal advice, which was definitive, that it was going to be ruled unconstitutional and we were not going to vote for things that are not legal. The High Court, indeed, ruled that that was the case.
There are other views in our community that I think are worth noting. This is not Liberal versus Labor versus Greens. There are a broad range of views within this community on this issue. I think it would be useful to quote from Julia Gillard, the former Labor parliamentarian, Prime Minister, leader of the left in the Labor Party, who said in 2011:
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