Speech by TUV leader Jim Allister during yesterday’s debate on same sex marriage:
“For me, this is not a matter of popularism but a matter of principle. It is not about being on the right or wrong side of history. For me, it is unapologetically about being on the side of that which is right, informed by my conscience and my religious belief, which quite properly can and should inform these matters.
“This is the fifth attempt in the House to redefine marriage, and that is what it is, despite what some have said. It is an attempt to redefine marriage, to replace the time-honoured, purposeful definition of “marriage” as being between one man and one woman with the perverse definition that demeans traditional marriage by equating it to same-sex marriage, to which there is no procreational purpose. There is only the purpose of pandering to the pretence that there is some right that is being denied. This is not a rights issue. As has been pointed out, there is no human right recognised by the European Convention on Human Rights or the European Court of Human Rights to same-sex marriage. It therefore cannot be and is not a rights issue, nor is it an issue of equality. Rather, there is a worked-up, phoney demand for rights where none does or should exist. There is no equality issue here.
“Of course, the demand is based on the fatuous suggestion that same-sex marriage is really the same as regular man-to-woman marriage and that there is no difference between the two. I would like to quote a source that I am maybe not given to quoting, but it is very apt on this occasion. I quote from a letter from the Catholic bishops to Members of the House. The letter dealt appropriately with that point when it stated:
“The proposed … motion before the assembly effectively says to parents, children and society that the state should not, and will not, promote any normative or ideal family environment for raising children. It therefore implies that the biological bond and natural ties between a child and its mother and father have no intrinsic value for the child or for society.”
“That is what the motion comes down to. It comes down to saying that the normative, natural environment of raising children with a father and a mother and their biological link is of no intrinsic value whatsoever and that you just equate the “unequatable” and simply roll together same-sex marriage, where procreation is impossible, with the traditional concept of regular marriage, where procreation is often but not on every occasion the natural process and the natural God-given environment in which to raise children to the best possible effect. So this is an issue that tries to equate two irreconcilable concepts: that of traditional marriage between a man and a woman and that of the phoney suggestion that, for no purpose other than to pander to what has been built up as a right when it is not a right, you give to others some equivalence to something that there is no equivalence within; namely, same-sex marriage.
“So, for the fifth time in the House, I will, robustly and with conviction, whatever the popularism might be, defend with my vote the right of traditional marriage, believing that that is a bedrock for the success of society, and believing that the more we tinker, tamper, demean and diminish that, the more we will take this society spiralling downwards. I think that we have done enough of that already.”