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The power and the influence

By Brian Greig - posted Thursday, 6 December 2007


The reality is Rudd Labor gained a 6 per cent swing across the nation from a range of constituencies on a host issues. Hostility to gays was not one of them.

In fact, credible polling (PDF 222KB) has recently shown that more than 70 per cent of Australians support equal rights for gay and lesbian people and 58 per cent support gay marriage itself. Using these survey results and Mr Wallace’s argument, then the majority of people who swung from Howard to Rudd at this election disagree with the ACL and support gay equality.

Yet, this does not stop Mr Wallace from firing a warning shot over the bow of the new government to assert: “[Rudd] not only recommitted the party to preserving marriage as the union of one man and one woman, but also pledged it to work with Labor state and territory governments to ensure that marriage is not mimicked by civil unions or partnerships.”

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I don’t think it’s any coincidence that this ACL editorial was published the very day after ACT Attorney General Simon Corbell confirmed the Territory Government would press ahead with civil unions for same-sex couples. While the previous Howard government had twice scuttled the Territories’ civil union plans, the Rudd Government is set to support it.

In reaction to this news, Mr Wallace moved swiftly to promote the myth that “Christians” helped Rudd to win but that they are opposed to civil unions, and so Rudd must come to heel or suffer the backlash.

It’s true that some hardline, Conservative Christians vote according to these narrow issues alone, but they are an isolated minority without electoral influence. Claiming otherwise is just a bluff on their part. Simply because many Australians describe themselves as Christian in the national census does not mean they oppose fairness and support discrimination.

Clearly, new Liberal leader Dr Brendan Nelson understands this given his significant policy shift announced just four days into his leadership, overturning decades of blanket hostility to gay rights and repositioning the Coalition to middle ground on this matter.

Now that the fundamentalist fraud has been exposed and the Federal Opposition have jettisoned past prejudice, it remains to be seen if Kevin Rudd will continue to pay more attention to the fears of the Religious Right than he has to the hopes of gay Australians.

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About the Author

Brian Greig is a former Democrats’ Senator (1999-2005), and long time gay rights campaigner. Today he works in public relations, Perth.

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