Katherine Zappone (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and her officials. She has been resolute, diligent and swift in drafting the legislative provisions to implement the will of the Irish people who said "Yes" to marriage equality on 22 May 2015. She is leading its passage through the Houses of the Oireachtas at a welcome pace, one that suits the scale and emotional depth of the people’s vote. I thank her.I welcome our marriage equality champions to the Seanad public Gallery and the AV room, and those who are watching online. I welcome my beloved life partner of 33 years - my spouse and wife of 12 years - Dr. Ann Louise Gilligan. I welcome the leaders of marriage equality, GLEN, ICCL, the USI, NXF, LGBT Noise, Belong To, TENI, Amnesty, and to the national family of Yes Equality. I think some are here from Mayo. Together we have made this freedom law possible.

I will begin by paraphrasing a line from William Butler Yeats because this is how I feel today - change comes dropping slow. When Ann Louise and I first imagined this change that we speak of today over 13 years ago - a change for ourselves, for other LGBT people and for Ireland - we never thought it would take this long. Our work now is almost completed and we have learned so many things in this length of time and the dropping slow of change. I am not the first to mention philosophy, the Minister has also mentioned it. Philosophically speaking, change is the essence of reality. It is the politics of change that throws up the contestations, conflicts, resistance and the prison of prejudice that must be overcome to unleash freedom for an oppressed minority. It is the politics of change, driven successfully by so many equality champions over the past decade, that laid the fertile soil for the people to take up our cause, stand with us, tell their stories, open their hearts, listen to our stories and open their minds to a new way of being human in Ireland. Before the vote, I often said that it is the Irish people who will have the power to banish inequality between a majority and a minority and that such an opportunity does not come often in a lifetime.

How did the people rise up for this? The politics of change became personal, especially for the young. The personal is political, as the elders know. The building of the national family of Yes Equality reaching out to every constituency in our republic and sparking the extraordinary phenomenon of #HomeToVote travellers crossed the generational, cultural and class divides to create an experience of solidarity, the likes of which many have never felt or witnessed before. It is this solidarity that created such pure joy on 23 May 2015 and it is this solidarity and joy that became visible throughout the globe. I pay tribute, not unlike my other colleagues, to every person who knocked on doors, every person who told their story, every person who went on the local and national airwaves, all who gathered for the fundraisers and those who wrote the cheques. I pay tribute to the politicians, our great colleagues in the Dáil, those of us here, especially Senator Norris and Senator Bacik, the political parties, the Independents, the Taoiseach and our Ministers, the mothers and fathers and children of LGBT people, the trans people, young and old, who said "You must include us too", the queen of Ireland, the artists for yes, the mayors for yes, the unions for yes, the children's organisations for yes, the lawyers for yes, the women's organisations for yes, the businesses for yes and all the other folks for yes who engaged in a political revolution 21st century style.

I pay special tribute to the Dublin South-West Yes Equality team that I led with Darragh Genockey. I thank them for every night they went out, every door they knocked on, every conversation they had, especially the difficult ones, and every time they bore witness to the cause of freedom of LGBT people. After the count in Citywest and after we opened all the boxes, we witnessed our results together - 71.3% of Dublin South-West said "Yes". Tallies demonstrated that some areas of Dublin South-West showed massive support for marriage equality, with some parts of Jobstown and Killanarden voting 85% "Yes", areas in Fettercairn voting 88% "Yes", parts of Ballyroan voting 82% "Yes" and estates of Rathfarnham voting 80% "Yes". These results and those throughout the country happened because of the generosity of the Irish people, because of the steadfastness of all of those who participated in this revolution and also because of the intelligence of the Yes Equality strategy, strategies to engage our citizens in the political process, all of whom know now that with citizen engagement deep and fundamental change is possible.

Another prime legacy of the marriage equality referendum is the experience of our people, especially our young people. If they care about a cause and see things that should change and that they want to change, they will know that change is possible. This can only be a good thing for our Republic especially as we approach the year of 2016. Senator O'Brien has already referred to that.

We have before us now the Bill that will enact equality and freedom for LGBT people and it puts in place the legislative provisions to enable couples to marry without distinction as to their sex. I look forward to teasing out the detail of the implications of these provisions on Committee and Report Stages of our Seanad deliberations. We have a Bill before us that when placed on the Irish Statute Book will carry the memory that citizens collaborating together can bring about fundamental change and can enable a cultural seismic shift for the good. May the memory that this law embodies provide an ongoing touchstone for our citizens to imagine other change that is necessary to bring about a republic of equals for all.

To conclude, I believe that the days of 22 and 23 May 2015 will go down in history as some of the greatest demonstrations for freedom in the history of our nation. When the Seanad passes this Bill, when President Michael D. Higgins signs it, and our two women Ministers, Deputy Frances Fitzgerald, and the Tánaiste, Deputy Joan Burton, agree when it will be commenced, we will be able to say:

Free at last. Free at last. Thank God, we are free at last.