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Gay Marriage

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flip_flop | 14:26 Sun 06th Jan 2013 | News
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Why is David Cameron so determined to push through this legislation, when there are more pressing things to be dealt with in the House?

Personally I couldn't give a tinker's cuss either way because it doesn't affect me.

I have seen it written in more than one source that the majority of gay people couldn't really care less either, so I'm struggling to understand why Cameron has got the bit between his teeth so much.
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If he thinks that this will win him lots of votes at the next election I think that he will come badly unstuck
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With an approx of 10 million gays in Britain he's trying to suck up to them. The same with the ethnic vote. Also the pensioner vote as he doesn't want to cut their inflation proofed benefits for fear of a revolt. He's like Blair in many ways trying to have a multicultural appeal where no part of society gets excluded. However his down the middle stance has upset many traditional Tory votes as shown by the switch of many of them to UKIP who have 16% now.
10 million (or about one in five adults) pdq? I think you're over-stating it a litlle. This suggests 3.6m:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/dec/11/gayrights.immigrationpolicy

and I reckon that's a bit heavy too.
Apparently Dave and Nick have been seen hand-in-hand in the night garden of number 10 in recent months. It was only the appearance of Iggle Piggle and the Ninky Nonk which averted any hanky panky.
// With an approx of 10 million gays in Britain he's trying to suck up to them. //

Pmsl
pdq1

I he wants to "suck up" to pensioners he should get rid of the so called Granny Tax. David Cameron and the Chancellor must think that no pensioner pays income tax. An estimated 4.6 million do.
flip_flop

Support amongst the general public now stands at 62% according to the latest ICM poll:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/dec/26/voters-back-gay-marriage-poll

Gay and lesbian voters' support for the Conservatives has similarly seen a dramatic increase because of the proposals:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/dec/26/same-sex-marriage-tory-gay-voters

Some more poll results:

http://www.attitude.co.uk/viewers/viewcontent.aspx?contentid=2487&catid=comment&subcatid=general_news&longtitle=TWO+THIRDS+SUPPORT+GAY+MARRIAGE

I think perhaps the poll you may have seen (which indicated that 'most gay people are against equal marriage proposals) came from the Catholic Voice. The problem was with the question they asked:

"If equal marriage were introduced, would you marry your partner"?

The problem with that question is that it was asking whether you would marry the person you were currently with. And not everyone actually DOES want to marry their current partner!

Doesn't mean they won't want to marry some other person in the future.
Oh, and did you know that CPs and traditional marriages aren't actually equal when it comes to pension rights?

If a gay couple get married today, then upon the death of one of the partners, the surviving partner would only be eligible for the pension contributions from the point that civil partnerships came into force. All pension contributions up until that point would not be available.

This isn't the case with traditional marriage.
Why? Well, we live in a country without debt and poverty, we have a GDP of 10%, and the Government has nothing better to do than introduce legislation for homosexuals and lesbians to "marry" than not a lot of people seem to want.

What next?
New Judge

There is only one section of society which is spending an inordinate amount of time on the equal marriage debate.

The Church of England and the Catholic Church.

Parliament has spent relatively little time on it, apart from the initial debate and then the consultation.

If you look at any of the main news outlets, all the running has been by the church (even the Pope has taken time out to pontificate on the subject).

Yes, there are important issues for the government to deal with, but to suggest that this be put on the back burner for some future time is madness. When has there ever been a period when the government had time to get on with background tasks?

This idea that the proposals should be shelved in order to deal with more pressing matters is code for 'these proposals should never be implemented'.
BlueToffee

But people do want it.

Not just gay couples. The figure now stands at 62-65% of the nation.

Should they simply be ignored?
sp, the manager at Woolworths, many years ago, told me that it was what people wanted when I queried his display of Eaaster Eggs.

The same in this case, if the looney Libs hadn't brought the subject up, no one would be bothered.

BlueToffee

Was it Easter at the time?
Sorry for the delay sp.......

No, it was Christmas Eve!
"Support amongst the general public now stands at 62% according to the latest ICM poll: "

Very possibly, sp. But the matter was not in any of the main parties' plans put forward for the 2010 election, nor was it in the Coalition Agreement (which seems to have trumped the manifestos anyway).

A sizeable proportion of the elctorate would like the opportunity to have a vote on the UK's future in the EU. This issue WAS mentioned in the Tory manifesto but, apart from a few wooly statements from the Prime Minister, precious little has happened, or seems likely to happen in the forseeable future.

It is for this reason that I would suggest that when, and only when, the government has completed all the measures that were promised to the electorate should it spend any time on things that were not.
New Judge

The whole manifesto?

Every single manifesto pledge has to be achieved and then a brand new manifesto be written?

Seems like strait jacket governance.

And seeing as the majority of the country is now solidly in favour of the proposals, I don't see a problem with the government using some time in doing what we elected them to do - represent our wishes.

If there are other manifesto pledges that they aren't honouring, then interested parties should lobby their MPs to ensure that they are.
Yes, sp. The whole manifesto.

I have my own views on the particular issue of gay marriage but they are not important. What is important is that in recent times there have been many instances where parties have been elected to power promising the earth only to renege on their commitments as soon as they take office and merrily set off in some other direction of their choosing. Usually it’s something like "we didn’t know the financial situation was so bad” (Yeah right. They hadn’t had the opportunity to examine the nation’s finances whilst in opposition). More often it’s simply a case of making promises to get elected and then proceeding to set their own agenda.

Of course there has to be some flexibility to act when circumstances demand it. I’m not suggesting that if the country was threatened with invasion we should not spend time debating what to do because it was not in the manifesto. But here is an instance of something that is not necessary, nobody expected it and, however little time you suggest it has taken, it is time too much whilst there are unfulfilled promises.

Party politics is a thorn in the side of this country’s well-being, but it seems we’re stuck with it. But that said, there is little point in producing a manifesto upon which parties expect the electorate to vote if it is simply to be substituted by political leaders’ wish-lists as soon as they take office.

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