Equal Marriage Consultation

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 11th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker—it is good to be here again. I welcome the Minister’s commitment to introduce same-sex marriages, but I am at a loss about why she could not have made all those points in the House yesterday, especially as most of them were made by Ministers to the press on Friday.

I agree with the Minister that we should support same-sex marriage. When couples want to get married and to make the long-term, loving commitment it entails, we should celebrate and not discriminate. Marriage is more than a historic tradition; it is about how the state and society today view and value long-term commitment. We should not prevent people from getting married and gaining recognition from the state on grounds of gender or sexuality, and Parliament should not say that some loving relationships have greater value than others.

While Labour was in government, we changed the law many times to tackle outdated prejudice and discrimination against lesbians, gay men, and bisexual and transgender people. Many of those measures were controversial at the time but are now taken for granted even by those who opposed them at the start: an equal age of consent, ending the ban on serving in the armed forces, ending discrimination in adoption and fertility treatment and abolishing section 28. Year after year, we changed the law and argued for the justice and common sense of each of those changes, and opponents were proved wrong—the sky did not fall in. This is the next sensible step. To deny same-sex couples the chance to marry and have their relationship recognised by the state as of equal worth to other loving couples would be unfair and out of date.

The Minister will know that I have argued for some time for those Churches and religious organisations that want to be able to celebrate same-sex marriage to be able to do so. I have met religious leaders from many faiths who want to be able to treat all loving couples equally and who show powerfully that the debate on same-sex marriage should not become polarised between Church and state. There are very different views between and within faiths.

I agree that freedom of religion is important. The Minister is right that no Church or religious organisations should be required to hold same-sex marriage and that respect for freedom of religion should be built into the proposed legislation, but we will need to look at the details of the proposals because it is important that she does not become too defensive about this. Freedom of religion also means that those faith groups, such as the Quakers, the Unitarians and others who want to be able to celebrate same-sex marriage should be able to do so. Those who argue that marriage should never change are out of touch with public feeling. Based on that argument, civil marriage would never have been introduced in the 1830s, married women would never have been given the right to own property, no one would be able to remarry after a divorce and the law would not have been changed to outlaw rape within marriage.

It is deeply disappointing that some in the House yesterday wanted to link same-sex marriage with polygamy or to suggest that it was somehow an affront to those in so-called normal marriages. I hope that those who have opposed the plans in the House and some Church leaders will think carefully and not repeat some of the hysterical language they have used before. These proposals include considerable respect for freedom of religion, freedom of belief and freedom for those who wish to continue to oppose same-sex marriage within their own organisations. I hope, however, that they will now respect the majority of us in the House and beyond who wish to support same-sex marriage and will not try to veto everyone else. No one faith, group or organisation owns marriage.

Surveys have found that seven out of 10 people support extending civil marriage to same-sex couples and that six out of 10 people of faith support extending it too. Marriage has never been a rigid, unchanging institution. It is only when marriage loses its relevance to communities or is seen as outdated or unjust that it risks becoming weakened or forgotten. I hope that the Minister will accept the support for these measures, promote them with confidence, not be defensive about the changes, and urge everyone to support the reforms, which will strengthen marriage and support equality too.

[Maria Miller]

I welcome the right hon. Lady’s support for the statement. She is right to highlight the widespread support for what the Government have outlined outside this place and on both sides of the House.

It is important to pick up on the right hon. Lady’s point about showing respect for both sides of the argument. As we participate in these or any discussions, none of us should try to polarise the debate. The language we use and the stance we take are looked at far and wide—people will be looking at how we deal with these issues—so I hope that hon. Members will appreciate and echo in their comments the respect that I am showing to religious institutions and to people in same-sex relationships. I think I made it clear that it is up to religious institutions to decide how they deal with these matters. That is not being defensive; it is about respecting those important religious beliefs.