Greens Vs Labor On Gay Marriage

Local News, By Joal, 4th December, 2009

Green and Labor parties in the ACT are at odds about how the territory should respond to the Federal Government’s decision to allow amended same-sex marriage laws.

ACT Greens are as yet undecided as to whether they will accept the federal government’s amendments to their proposed marriage laws, but ACT Attorney General Simon Corbell says he wants members to accept the changes or face having no relationship recognition at all.

“We know what will happen if we don’t accept or at least indicate a willingness to negotiate on this matter,” Corbell told ABC Radio. “For the first time we’ve had a federal government agree that there is not a problem for us legislating for legal ceremonies, with legal celebrants. We need to lock in this reform.”

Greens member Shane Rattenbury disagrees with the attorney-general, telling ABC Online, “”if it’s not broken you don’t need to fix it.”

“It’s so much splitting hairs that people are saying why don’t we stick with the original bill – the original bill that the Greens put up is a good one,” Rattenbury told ABC. “At this stage we’re not inclined to accept these amendments because there is no clear reason why we need to make them. Nobody has articulated what the problem is with the legislation, they’ve just said here’s a fix that we need for it.”

The Greens say they will consult with community members and leaders before making a decision on how they will vote on the amendments.

If the ACT legislature votes against the Federal Government’s amendments, the decision will then be with the Rudd government whether to overturn the law completely.

On the proposed amendments, Australian Marriage Equality national secretary Alex Greenwich told AAP that they were to appease right-wing community groups. “It basically means the ceremony itself is not legally binding – that’s what we were striving for. It’s a matter of principle,” says Rattenbury. “What the ALP has proposed only creates a very confusing scheme designed to appease the religious right and equality advocates. It ends up making nobody happy.”