New political party wants to represent LGBTI community

New political party wants to represent LGBTI community

A NEW political party advertising a focus on LGBTI issues at a state and federal level was launched last week.

The Australian Equality Party plans to run initially for the Australian Senate at the 2016 Federal Election, then to contest seats in local elections and in state and federal elections, in upper and lower houses.

The AEP’s first potential candidate for the Senate is party convener and practising marriage celebrant Jason Tuazon-McCheyne, who has been involved for a number of years in organisations relating to rainbow families.

He told the Star Observer the party came out of frustrations after last year’s federal election that the LGBTI community was not properly represented in parliament.

“A group of gay and lesbian people were sitting around talking about some rainbow families and some other things that we’ve all been involved in,” Tuazon-McCheyne said.

“It rose to the top, an idea I’d been thinking about, and I said, ‘We need to have our own independent gay voice inside the federal parliament. It’s time for us to actually stand up and speak for ourselves.’ And that idea last October has spawned this party.”

Tuazon-McCheyne was a Christian minister until the age of 28, when he came out as gay and was rejected by that community. Continuing to officiate weddings as a civil celebrant, he soon met his partner of 16 years Adrian, and the two now have an eight-year-old son through a surrogacy arrangement.

Although the party is still developing its policy platforms, there initially appears to be a focus on marriage and family-related issues.

“One of our policy platforms is marriage equality, but it’s the family stuff around that. There’s adoption issues and surrogacy issues and ‘not everyone’s on the birth certificate’ issues and parenting order issues and all that sort of stuff,” he said.

Tuazon-McCheyne explained these issues form part of one of AEP’s four initial stated aims, also iterating a focus on anti-discrimination. He identified the removal of religious exemptions in anti-discrimination law and the need for specific anti-homophobia policies at a government level as part of that focus.

“Marriage and family is one tenet, the discrimination thing is our other tenet and that covers everything else,” he said.

“And then the third tenet is to be a voice for our community at every level of politics in Australia, and then the fourth tenet, which is also important, is that we’re a human rights party at the end of the day.”

The potential candidate was unable to name any of the party’s specific trans or intersex-focused policy platforms, but said he planned to consult broadly so the whole LGBTI community is represented.

“I’ve got meetings with people over the next six to eight weeks to actually ask them face to face… It is badly understood and one of the first things that’s on my plate is to understand them really well and to be a voice,” Tuazon-McCheyne said.

“All of those issues are going to be something that we’ll advocate for and we’ll expand [our focus] as we go along, but we have to start somewhere.”

He also stressed that AEP is not aligned to any other political parties, and hoped at the next federal election people would consider giving them their vote in the upper house while voting for whoever they identified with in the lower house.

As a fledgling organisation the AEP still needs a total of 500 members to be able to register as a political party, and Tuazon-McCheyne encouraged interested members of the LGBTI or heterosexual communities to join.

 

 

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4 responses to “New political party wants to represent LGBTI community”

  1. I welcome the Australian Marriage Equality Party!!!!

    What an excellent idea, for far too long Labor, Liberal, Democrats, Greens have ABANDONED us for all those years.

    I voted 1 for the Sex Party in the last federal election!!!!!!

    Where do I join up, I want to run in the 2016 Senate too??????

    It is HIGH TIME for marriage equality here in Australia and really need to get out head out of the sand and join most of the rest of the western world!!!!!

    • Just curious Paul, in what way do you feel the ” Greens have ABANDONED us for all those years”

      The record shows that they are the only party that has unequivocally pushed for same sex rights since their inception over 30 years ago.

      So, I genuinely ask you, what makes you say the above in relation to The Greens?

  2. What a breath of fresh air. Labor and the LNP still maintain discrimination in the equal opportunity act, giving religious businesses the right to sack us, or not give a deserved promotion, even when those businesses are funded with our taxes. More cruelly, in Victoria we can foster for years, but never adopt. With private super being allowed to discriminate, and so many other laws discriminating against non married couples, perhaps the question is not so much about marriage equality, but why have laws that discriminate against non married couples. Marriage used to be up to the couple, and their community. Government intrusion into our lives, at current levels, is an invasion of our privacy.

    It is also time we had hate speech laws in Victoria. What power does a young 17 year old same sex at tracked person have against the homophobic and transphobic tirades in editorials that appear in papers like the Bairnsdale advertiser? The latest sayings transgender ism is a for of child abuse. The old tired parties continue throwing breadcrumbs. I want a party that does not say discrimination is ok for GLBTI people.

    I wish this new party all the best. As we have seen in recent times, the power of just one can make a huge difference.

  3. Interesting, I am a pluralist when it comes to political parties, ie, the more choice the better, however would be hesitant to support a party based purely on my sexuality.

    The LGBTIQ communities are diverse and to be honest, whilst I can accept the concept of Marriage Equality a step towards ending some level of discrimination I am not a fan of homogenisation, or “normalising” the community.

    We should fight for acceptance no matter how diverse we are, not try and look like every body else.

    Of more concern to me is the new party’s attitude to Liberal Economic Principles vs State ownership of essential services and utilities etc.

    If they could realise some information on the basic ideologies than an informed decision to support/not support could be made.