Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Monday 8th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Pannick]

I respectfully object to the suggestion that a Bill with these purposes and valuable effects should distinguish between same-sex marriage and opposite-sex marriage and necessarily imply a division between them. That is what I object to.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I added my name to the amendment because I felt that it was not churlish, derogatory or demeaning. In fact, it indicates that those of us who have profound misgivings about the Bill have done all that we can to acknowledge the validity of the arguments of those who are its champions. All the amendment does is repeat certain words that are in the Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, or any other noble Lord can talk until he is blue in the face without altering the fact that there is a difference between a same-sex marriage and a marriage between a man and a woman. All this amendment does is acknowledge that. It concedes the word “marriage”.

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[Lord Lester of Herne Hill]

My Lords, I cannot remember whether the Race Relations Act 1976 had already come into force when I got married 41 years ago in the Brixton register office. However, suppose that that Act had not come into force at that time. In Brixton, there are a lot of black people. If I had wanted to marry a black person and we turned up at the Brixton register office, where the registrar looked at us and said, “I’m very sorry, but I have a conscientious objection to mixed marriages. I don’t wish in any way to undermine you, but I just can’t do this”, that would be impermissible. A public servant who is performing statutory duties must not discriminate on any forbidden grounds.

[Lord Cormack]

Will my noble friend concede that there is a difference between racism, which is bigotry, and a deeply held belief?

[Lord Lester of Herne Hill]

My Lords, I understand the difference. Bigots normally have deeply held beliefs. My point is not about the sincerity of the belief but the discriminatory conduct of a public officer. We have never before, in the various phases of introducing and enacting—

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Moved by

[Lord Cormack]

5: After Clause 1, line 4, leave out “for life to the exclusion of all others”

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I will not detain the House long. I do not disagree with what the noble Lord, Lord Dear, said, but I seek to sharpen up his amendment for two reasons. First, I have been approached by many people during the passage of the Bill through your Lordships’ House who believe very firmly that marriage is between a man and a woman and wish to see that recognised at all appropriate points, but have themselves not been able necessarily to sustain marriage for life.

It is a fact of life—the noble Lord, Lord Dear, briefly alluded to it—that many marriages do not stay the course. There are many in your Lordships’ House who have been married more than once. That does not in any sense weaken or invalidate the marriage, or make those noble Lords who have had more than one marriage believe less in marriage as an institution. But we live in a very different world from that of 1866 cited by the noble Lord, Lord Dear. Even within the clergy, I have many good friends, some highly placed within the Church of England, who have had a marriage that has come to grief. Some have remarried and some have not. In that spirit of tolerance, understanding and generosity, to quote my noble friend Lord Deben in a previous debate, it would be more inclusive just to omit those words. That does not in any sense weaken the thrust of the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Dear; it merely brings it up to date and recognises the world in which we live.

My second amendment is slightly more playful in that I would take away the words “in a democratic society” because this belief is worthy of respect in all societies, democratic or not. We recognise that. It is certainly not an amendment to an amendment that I would press. However, I must say to your Lordships’ House that those of us who believe in traditional marriage but are not in any way opposed to equality—one must repeat that, as one has many times during these debates—feel that including something along these lines in the Bill could not do any harm and could be of some reassurance to many people outside this House. They are the sort of people referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Dear, and by the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, in what I thought was a very moving speech in an earlier debate this afternoon. I beg to move the amendment to the amendment.

[Lord Pannick]

My Lords, nothing in the Bill prevents the noble Lords, Lord Dear and Lord Cormack, believing and expressing a belief in so-called traditional marriage. Contrary to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Dear, there is nothing in the Bill that “coerces” people to “jettison”—the noble Lord’s words—their beliefs in any of these respects. This has repeatedly been explained by noble Lords and to noble Lords during our debates on the Bill. If, as the noble Lord, Lord Dear, suggests, millions of decent people have concerns, they are completely unfounded and it does no service to them whatever to give credence to such basic misunderstandings.

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[Lord Elton]

Before the noble Lord does that, can I just remind him that we are actually debating the amendment to his amendment? The last word on that has not yet been said.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I am most grateful for the generosity and courtesy of my noble friend Lord Elton. I will not detain your Lordships. I wish to withdraw the amendment to the amendment. Having understood that that desire is similar to that of the noble Lord, Lord Dear, we appear to be in accord.

Amendment 5 (to Amendment 4) withdrawn.