Gillard facing state revolt
The Western Australia and New South Wales branches of the Labor Party are expected to call on their federal counterparts to legislate same-sex marriage at their upcoming state conferences. On Sunday, Queensland’s State ALP Conference voted in favour of a motion calling on both the federal Labor Party and this year’s ALP National Conference to support same-sex marriage.
The Western Australian branch of the ALP is expected to vote on a similar motion this Saturday, and the NSW vote is scheduled for July.
A similar motion at this year’s Victorian State ALP Conference was torpedoed as a result of Prime Minister Julia Gillard and right-wing unionists pressuring delegates to stay away, denying quorum when the issue was to be debated.
However, a similar motion was passed in 2009, meaning the Victorian ALP’s support for marriage equality remains on the record. Similar motions have been passed by the South Australian, Tasmanian, and Northern Territory branches of the ALP, as well as at the national ALP Women’s Conference last month.
ACT Chief Minister Katy Gallagher went on the record with her support for same-sex marriage in May, and WA Labor leader Eric Ripper spoke out in support of marriage equality on Monday, meaning that nearly all state and territory Labor Party branches support a change in policy.
NSW Rainbow Labor co-convenor Jessica Epps hopes that NSW, the last state conference before the party’s National Conference in December, will join other states in sending a message to the federal Government.
“There will be a motion debated at our state conference but at this stage we are still awaiting the release of the NSW Labor conference booklet to confirm the exact wording of motions put forward,” Epps said.
“We will be working hard for that motion to succeed and for that success to build momentum for change at the ALP National Conference later in the year.”
Openly lesbian NSW Labor MLC Penny Sharpe (pictured) confirmed that a motion would be debated.
While focusing on the National Conference and August 13’s National Day of Action, marriage equality campaigners around Australia will be active. A dinosaur has been organised to prowl the surrounds of the Sydney Town Hall, the conference venue, to draw attention to outdated views about GLBTI people held by some conference delegates.
“We thought it would be great to organise some kind of stunt to draw attention to the fact that the NSW ALP is going to be voting on the policy,” Community Action Against Homophobia co-convenor Cat Rose said.
“It’s clear from the polls that show that 75 percent of people think marriage equality is inevitable that these laws are seen as backward and outdated.
“It’s not going to be a mass rally but it is something people can participate in and we’d definitely encourage people to come down on the day.”
The NSW State ALP Conference is on July 9 and 10.
Victorian marriage equality activists are expected to go to Sydney in December to join national conference protesters.
The next Equal Love rally in Melbourne is August 13.
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Re; Annon,
Forcing our way of life onto the majority is not what we are asking for, we simply would like equal rights when it comes to marriage, adoption and many other facets of everyday life that you would take for granted.
If you feel like we are forcing our way of life onto others then how would you feel if marriage was taken away from you, lets also say if for example your wife or signifcant other might not be able to bear a child you were also not allowed to adopt. These issues are very present for GLBT people in Australia.
People like you make this world corrupt and not a nice place to live in, I can only hope that when you have children or if you already have that one of them might be gay so you can begin to truly understand, your comments are ridiculous and you need a wake up call.
This is disgusting… Minority gay groups forcing their way of life off on the majority…
I’ll be attending the NSW state conference as a delegate of local ALP members in the state seat of Sydney.
Inner-Sydney ALP branches strongly support marriage equality and I’ll be doing what I can to encourage the state conference to also support it.
I encourage anyone who is a member of a union to contact their union and encourage them to support reform at the state conference.