Alex White (Labour)

I support Senator Norris's motion and oppose the amendments put forward. Having been detained in a committee meeting for the past two hours, I have not had an opportunity to hear any of my colleagues' contributions, so I am somewhat constrained in responding to the debate. We all know that the married family, if I can call it that, is at the heart of our Constitution. The Supreme Court has repeatedly made clear that the family, as characterised by the union of two persons in marriage, enjoys inalienable and imprescriptable rights. So much of our jurisprudence in regard to the family and children has flown from this fundamental and repeatedly sanctioned principle.

The rights of persons in a family characterised by marriage are immeasurably greater than those enjoyed by others. Senator Norris makes an unanswerable argument when he states that for as long as we have an exclusion on the rights of gay people to get married, there will remain at the heart of our constitutional system and our society a fundamental inequality. "Marriage trumps everything" was a phrase used by one of the lawyers in the discussion we had earlier on the proposed children's rights referendum. Marriage is at the core of everything. With respect to my colleagues on the other side of the House, it is not enough for the Minister or others to present a list of all the positive developments that have taken place in this area as if they were gifts to gay people, as if employment and equality legislation and other developments are somehow to be regarded as enough. The attitude is, "You have these concessions, be happy."

I wholeheartedly support Senator Norris's position that it is not enough to say these developments, important and fundamental as they are, have been achieved. To establish true equality, we must extend the right to marry to gay persons. It is a question of political courage. The Minister said in his speech that if a proposal of this type were put to the people, it would be deeply divisive and would not necessarily be passed. Deeply divisive proposals have been put to the electorate before. More than that, many of the proposals put to the people were inherently divisive. Nobody looks for division or seeks to be divisive but these difficult issues must be addressed. It is not enough to state that we should shy away from them because of the likelihood of a potentially divisive and difficult public debate. That is not how legislators should behave. This is a time for courage.