Page 5454 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 16 November 2011
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I think these are entirely unsatisfactory ways for this to be dealt with. Moving through the federal parliament, with consistent national law, is clearly the best possible way for this to be dealt with.
It is important, I think, to be very clear that marriage is a legal construct created by parliament. Climbing out of that is the fact that parliaments are vested with the power to change the law, how it is applied and whom it applies to. Again that is why we think it is entirely appropriate for this Assembly to have this discussion tonight and for the federal parliament to be the one who changes this law. To suggest that the federal parliament should not do so, I think, ignores the fact that it is obviously very much the legal construct of the parliament and that we should cede and move on this matter.
I think there is a lot more I could say. I think there is a great deal of this that is about values. It is about respect. It is about acknowledging differences in our community but also acknowledging the many differences we may have. We also still enjoy, as a community, those great moments of celebration, those great moments of ceremony, and marriage of course is one of the great rituals in our society. Not everybody chooses it these days. There is certainly a comment made out there when this debate is had at times. People say: “Why would you possibly want to get married? You can have it.” That may be the case for some but there are many in our community for whom marriage is an important rite of passage, and I think that all members of our community should be able to enjoy that rite of passage and share it with their families and their friends in what is so often a very happy occasion.
Let me simply say in conclusion that we are not the first parliament in Australia to debate this motion this year and I certainly hope we will not be the last. As more parliaments debate motions like this in coming weeks and months and they have discussions as matters of public importance, as members talk about this in adjournment debates and as the debate continues through the national media, the momentum for change will grow.
I do believe we are now at the stage where equal marriage is not a question of if it will happen but simply a question of when, and again the attitude of the Australian community, as captured in those opinion polls, underlines that point very clearly. I think that in many ways the political debate is behind our community. Members of our community are well ahead of many politicians when it comes to this issue and I think that some members of parliament are out of step with their own constituency.
Certainly my federal colleague Adam Bandt had a motion passed through the federal parliament earlier this year, asking members of the federal parliament to go back to their communities and talk to their own communities. I would like to think that those parliamentarians took that seriously and I suspect when they went out there they found that the Australian community is very accepting of this notion. I look forward to the day the federal parliament catches up with the broader community, because ultimately the question of timing will be one answered by federal politicians. I hope that by our having this discussion today, bringing this motion forward and ideally passing it, we can bring about that change sooner rather than later. I commend the motion to the Assembly.
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