Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill

Brooks Newmark Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

I shall be voting against this Bill because I am a Conservative, and also because an overwhelming number of my constituents are against it. I have had, I think, three letters in support of the Bill. That reflects opinion in the Christchurch constituency.

The proponents of this Bill are under one fundamental misconception—that because a man and a woman are equal before the law, therefore they are the same. They are not the same; men and women are different. Same-sex couples may be equal before the law, but we cannot force them into marriage, which at the moment is set up on the basis that it is between a man and a woman. Sir Mark Potter, president of the family division, spoke of the common-law definition of marriage:

“The voluntary union for life of one man and one woman, to the exclusion of all others.”

We ignore that fact at our peril.

[Mr Brooks Newmark (Braintree) (Con)]

My hon. Friend raises a good point about the constituency postbag that many of us have received. I am curious to know, however, whether he has looked at the age profile of the people who write to him. Surely, as it is for most of us, those who are older—60 plus—tend to be the most outraged by this Bill. I have five children, and if any of them thought I was going to oppose this Bill, they would think I was bonkers. The vast majority of people under 40 support this Bill.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. We must have shorter interventions on the grounds that everybody wants to contribute. It is important that we hear everybody’s voice.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Blunt]

I am delighted to hear that intervention from my hon. Friend. I advocate that Members support the Bill and make those distinctions even clearer as the Bill passes through the House.

Much as the Bill will be another step forward; even unamended it gives us the vehicle properly to differentiate marriage in the eyes of the state from religious marriage. Simply put, we should be legislating for equal civil marriage and enabling religious organisations to carry out same-sex marriages if they wish to do so, and protecting them if they do not.

[Mr Newmark]

In supporting that point, I am sure my hon. Friend is aware of the book “Animal Farm”, in which all animals are equal but some are more equal than others, and is it not now time, in 21st-century Britain, that men should be allowed to marry men, women should be allowed to marry women, and men should be allowed to marry women in a civil marriage, not a religious marriage?

[Mr Blunt]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. We need to distinguish between civil marriage in the eyes of the state, which we are absolutely entitled to legislate for—indeed, there is a requirement on us to do so—and marriage in the eyes of people’s gods and religious beliefs, which is different.

I therefore advocate a situation such as in France, where one ceremony is required in the eyes of the state as well as another religious service, or, preferably, for religious organisations to be able to deliver marriage in the eyes of the state. Either of those positions would be better than continuing inequality, and I predict that if we do not change this Bill, Parliament will have to revisit the issue.

If this more fundamental change meets both the profound concerns expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Steve Baker) and a number of others and the test of permanent equality in the eyes of the state, it has much to recommend it. This Bill starts us down the right road, and I welcome it, but I urge the House to do a thorough job in Committee and on Report so as not to leave avoidable unfinished business.