Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Wednesday 10th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Turner of Camden]

My Lords, I have not spoken before this evening, mainly because I have very much wanted to listen to what other people had to say. However, I really feel rather annoyed about this amendment. Why on this particular Bill? In the past year or so, we have sat through legislation from this Government on an enormous range of issues: welfare, employment law, foreign policy intervention and so on. Has there been any pressure for a referendum on these issues? No, there has not. However, we now have the opportunity, at long last, of producing legislation to try to and put right the discrimination which gays and lesbians have suffered for many years. We are aiming to do that, and we are doing it. We have voted in favour of the Bill, in this House and in the other place, with an overwhelming majority. The law is now absolutely clear: it says that the marriage of same-sex couples is lawful—I repeat, is lawful. Yet this amendment suggests that a referendum be held on 24 October 2013 and that there should be a statement on the ballot paper which says:

“At present, the law in England and Wales defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Should the law be changed”,

et cetera. By the time we reach October, the law will quite clearly not be the same as indicated in this proposed new clause. It will have changed because we will have voted to change the law to make the marriage of same-sex couples lawful.

I listened with amazement as the noble Lord who moved the amendment suggested that somehow or other that was not popular. In my view, this legislation is very popular, particularly with younger people. Perhaps much older people have some doubts about it but, generally speaking, younger people are all in favour of it. I was pleased that after the Second Reading debate, when I looked at my computer, I had messages from all sorts of people, including younger people, saying, “Well done, well done”, about my speech. We do not need a referendum. We should throw this amendment out. It is not worthy at all. Why should it be in the Bill? The amendment is entirely discriminatory, and I urge your Lordships to oppose it.

[Lord Fowler]

My Lords, I note, with respect, that the noble Lord who introduced the amendment says that the arguments were not considered in the Commons. What I think he actually means is that they were considered; it is just that he does not agree with the conclusion that both Houses came to. That tends to happen in a democracy. We make our decisions on the basis of the arguments. I do not think that one can argue for a referendum on the basis that one disagrees with a decision. There is not a great deal of difference, frankly, between what we are debating now and what we debated in Committee.

I leave aside the wording of the question that would be put, which seems to say, “The present law is excellent, or are you one of that band of eccentrics who thinks that it should be changed?”. I am not sure that the Electoral Reform Society would totally agree with such a question being asked in a referendum. However, my objection is much broader than that.

I am not opposed to referenda on constitutional issues. My Government made a mistake back in 1972; we should have had a referendum before we went into the Common Market. I am glad that Mr Cameron is promising a referendum after his negotiations on Europe and before the matter comes to the Commons after the next election. What I cannot support is holding a referendum after a Bill has gone through both Houses of Parliament and after our extensive discussions in both Houses. The Bill has been approved by massive majorities. There is no question about that. It is not on the margins; there have been massive majorities for the Bill. That is particularly the case for Members of Parliament because it is they who, at the next election, have to answer to their constituents. That is what parliamentary democracy is about.

You cannot have a situation whereby legislation in Parliament goes through the Commons and the Lords and then we have a referendum on it. It makes complete nonsense of the role of Parliament and of parliamentary democracy. One of my underlying concerns about some of the opposition to this legislation is that we are going against our fundamental beliefs in parliamentary democracy and the role of this House. This House, at this stage, should not be considering an amendment of this kind. Its only purpose can be to wreck the Bill as a last chance to ditch it, and we should not have any part in it. Therefore, with respect to the noble Lord, to whom I have listened previously, and again now, I am totally unconvinced by his argument.

[Lord Waddington]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Fowler is making rather a meal of it. I can think of only one justification for having a referendum, and that is to allow the Prime Minister to get off the hook on which he has impaled himself by bringing forward this Bill in the first place. Everybody knows that the Bill came forward to Parliament in a most disreputable fashion. We have gone over this many times, so I will say it in a sentence or two. Three days before the election, the Prime Minister said that he had no plans to bring forward such a Bill; there was no reference to it in any party manifesto; there was nothing about it in the coalition agreement; and there was no proper consultation. The result is that UKIP is having a field day—

[Lord Fowler]

My noble friend accuses me of making a meal of it, but he is making a massive feast of the whole thing. Surely, every argument he has just produced has been debated and debated again, at Second Reading in both the Commons and the Lords.

[Lord Waddington]

The trouble is that my noble friend has not listened to the end of my argument, which is that as a result of the Prime Minister’s behaviour, UKIP has been gleaning Tory votes throughout the country. If we do not do anything about it, at the next general election UKIP will no doubt be making hay as a result. I suggest to my noble friend that the only real justification for having a referendum is to help the Prime Minister by removing the whole issue from the public arena well before the next general election.