Page 1771 - Week 05 - Thursday, 8 May 2008
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territory law. No longer will they have to rely on proving some sort of de facto status. No longer will the power bill and the bank accounts have to come out to demonstrate that you are actually in a committed and caring relationship with someone and dependent on each other financially as well as emotionally, as well as in a whole range of other ways. That is a step forward and we should be proud of that achievement. We should be proud of the steps we take to recognise those relationships and give them a greater level of equality under the law.
Finally, what I would say in relation to this legislation is that it is not the big step we wanted to take, but it is a step. It is, as the Chief Minister said, a significant step. Today we take that step resolutely. We take it with confidence and we say that this is not the end of the debate. We say that this debate will continue and the hypocrites and the deniers and the apologists will see us again. They will see us in this parliament or they will see us in another parliament somewhere in this country, but it is inevitable that one day full equality will be granted same-sex couples in our community and around the country. I commend the bill to the Assembly.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Bill agreed to in principle.
Detail stage
Bill, by leave, taken as a whole.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (2.42 am): Mr Speaker, I seek leave to move amendments 1 to 15 circulated in my name together.
Leave granted.
MR CORBELL: I move my amendments 1 to 15 together [see schedule 6 at page 1784]. I table a supplementary explanatory statement to the amendments.
For the sake of the record, I would like to clarify that where the amendments indicate that the clause is to be opposed, the intention is that the clause is omitted from the bill. If I can speak to these amendments for the record, the matters addressed in these amendments are as follows.
First of all, in relation to creation of the relationship, this substantive amendment is to clause 6 of the bill to make it clear that a civil partnership is not created by this legislation but registered under it. Two adults who are in a relationship as a couple may apply to have their relationship recognised by registration as a civil partnership.
Secondly, in relation to eligibility, clause 7 is replaced by a new provision setting out the eligibility requirements for entering into a civil partnership. A person may only enter into a civil partnership if the person is not married or in another civil partnership; the person does not have a prohibited relationship, that is, an ancestor, descendant, sibling or half-sibling, with their proposed civil partner, and at least one other party to the declaration of a civil partnership is normally resident in the ACT.
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