Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 4th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton]

My Lords, I am pleased to be here and that I heard the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, coming over the hill as cavalry in aid of the noble Lord, Lord Dear. It is an honour to give the opposition winding speech on this Second Reading debate in your Lordships’ House. I am not envious of the task that the Minister has in answering the substantial and passionate debate that we have had for the past two days. My noble friend Lady Royall outlined most eloquently in her opening remarks the reasons why Labour is supporting this Bill and the Government, but as in the Commons there will be a free vote. I shall not repeat all of her arguments.

When we are contemplating something new, I always think that international comparisons are helpful. Last month this House supported making caste discrimination part of our legislative equality framework. In doing this, and persuading the Government and the Commons that it was the right thing to do, we were blazing an international trail of which we should be proud. Today, we are not being so adventurous, because we are proposing that the UK will soon join those countries that have now signed same-sex marriage into law. They are Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Iceland, the Netherlands, Portugal, Norway, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, Uruguay and now France.

I offer my congratulations to Vincent Autin and Bruno Boileau on their marriage last week. It was historic for being the first same-sex marriage to take place in France following President Hollande’s signing of the legislation into law. First and foremost, it was a momentous day for this couple, who on that day made a loving and lifelong commitment to one another before their friends and family, just as I and many in this House have done over the years.

The objections to the Bill to bring same-sex marriage on to the statute book seem to fall into two or three categories. There are noble Lords who are uncertain that freedom of religion will be respected by the Bill. To them I say that the Government have built huge safeguards into the Bill, which, it is widely agreed, will do the job. The most reverend Primate and the right reverend Prelates who have spoken have woven brilliant theology and arguments against the principle of same-sex marriage, but as the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, my noble friend Lady Mallalieu and others have said, the state’s concept of marriage has been ever-evolving. It has long since diverged from religious teaching. They have not managed to unpick the locks, so to speak.

While lawyers can always find something to disagree about, I would encourage those noble Lords to read back the speeches of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and my noble friend Lady Kennedy of The Shaws, who have explained the strong assurances that legal security is provided by the Bill. Some concerns have been raised by noble Lords about the position of teachers and faith schools in reconciling their views of marriage with the new reality. My party is confident that the current law achieves the right balance in securing the right of faith schools to educate pupils in a way that is sensitive to the law of the land and also to students, some of whom may be gay or have parents of the same sex. I may never use these words again, but I agree with the evidence that Michael Gove gave to the scrutiny Committee stage in the Commons. However, it is right that these issues will be tested and scrutinised by this House in Committee, because it is right that these questions and concerns are allayed.

There are those who say that the Bill is in some ways anti-democratic, that it was not in manifestos, that there was no Green Paper—and, they add, let us rubbish the consultation—and they ask why it was not a Private Member’s Bill. The noble Lords, Lord Norton and Lord Kerr, covered the constitutional points, and I agree with their analysis. We have to look at the strength of feeling in favour of the Bill in the Commons. It is remarkable that the majorities at Second Reading and Third Reading were so large. It may serve the opponents’ purpose to suggest that some kind of secret Whip was applied, but I am with the noble Lords, Lord Cope and Lord Bates, about the whippability of such an issue.

Many MPs thought very hard about the Bill and had serious discussions with constituents before deciding how to vote, but each MP made a decision alone about whether to support it, and so must we. Rarely as parliamentarians do we have the opportunity, by the words that we use and the votes that we cast today, to affirm the equal respect that we have for our fellow citizens regardless of their sexuality and the equal respect that we have for their long-term and loving relationships.

We have also had a bit of scaremongering. Scaremongering to further an argument in which you passionately believe is a legitimate debating ploy, but noble Lords are wise and experienced enough to recognise scaremongering when they see it. We can safely say that the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, won the award for this one. In a short and sharp intervention, he managed with his usual skill to provide a scare for almost everything, including compulsory promotion of homosexual marriage and artificial insemination of the heir to the throne.

[Lord Tebbit]

Clearly, the noble Baroness has the answer to all questions and is going to tell me the answer to the question that I asked about the heir to the throne.

[Baroness Thornton]

Yes, goal. I am happy to say that it is the Minister who answers the questions here.

The noble Lord, Lord Dear, also did quite well in the old scaremongering field when he said that some 8,000 amendments might be required by this legislation. I thought that that was remarkable and checked whether it is true. I am pleased to reassure the House that this seems not to be the case. The noble Lord seems to have confused the fact that there are indeed 8,000 references to marriage within the total library of legislation, without the need to amend them all. Furthermore, it is clear from discussion with the Bill team and reading the Bill that Clause 11 and Schedule 4 deal more than adequately with his concerns. I am sure that the Bill team will be happy to explain this to the noble Lord in due course.

Other noble Lords feel uncomfortable with what they see as a departure from traditional marriage. I do not doubt that this is how they feel, but I ask them to reflect a little deeper on those feelings. Is it habit and familiarity that make change uncomfortable and unsettling? This was referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Jenkin. The Minister noted that we all move at a different pace when faced with change. As the noble Lord, Lord Deben, put it so eloquently, major social changes do not happen when the majority align themselves; they have almost always happened when a minority has stood up for what it believes to be right, put it to the public and in the end proved that it is right.

Unfortunately, some who profess to believe in equal rights for everyone, regardless of gender, race and sexual orientation, find it difficult fully to escape prejudices ingrained over many years when homosexuality was said to be at worst an abomination, or at least something to be very quiet and discreet about because it bordered on the shameful. To noble Lords who are finding the idea of same-sex marriage difficult to come to terms with, I make a plea that they should listen to their heart and indulge their generosity of spirit. Having heard the deeply personal speeches of the noble Lords, Lord Browne and Lord Smith, my noble friends Lord Alli and Lord Collins, the noble Lord, Lord Black of Brentwood, the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, and the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, it would be hard not to be moved—and it would be very hard-hearted not to support same-sex marriage.

The noble Lord, Lord Faulks, asked me a direct question: would my Government have brought in this legislation? Given that we brought forward all the equalities legislation between 1997 and 2010, and given the presence of my noble friend Lord Alli over my shoulder, how could I say otherwise? It is the personal testimony not just of noble Lords who have faced discrimination and struggle because of their same-sex relationships, but of all noble Lords who have spoken of the love and strength they have found through their partners, civil partners, husbands and wives, that should secure our resolve to reject the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Dear, and proceed with the Bill. I speak of my noble friends Lady Royall, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, Lord Young of Norwood Green and many others.

For many, marriage is the glue—my noble friend Lady Mallalieu called it the superglue—that binds together relationships and gives those in them the strength to face life’s challenges. To have the opportunity to extend this privilege to all couples who want to make that commitment is something that we must now embrace and celebrate as a means to a stronger and more loving society.

I look forward to the Bill receiving a Second Reading today and to getting on with the Committee stage, where I hope we will make progress with many of the issues raised by my colleagues and by noble Lords across the House. We on these Benches will look at pension rights, transgender couples, about which my noble friend Lady Gould spoke so passionately, and humanist marriages, which were referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Birt, and which we are keen to see introduced. Therefore, I urge the House to vote against the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Dear, and to see the Bill through to its next stage. For the sake of clarity, if noble Lords support the continued passage of the Bill, the Lobby to go into is the Not-Content, and I look forward to seeing many of them there.