The Same Sex Adoption Debate
It would be instructive to make a few comments about the debate that caused so many people to get upset: The Adoption Amendment (Same Sex Couples) Bill No 2:
1. This Bill will have profound impact upon venerable people. It is largely a clash between vulnerable people (usually children who have parents unavailable to care for them) and vocal people (usually adult people living in a lesbian or homosexual relationship). The Parliament was very evenly split in the Assembly and in the Legislative Council showing Parliament does reflect the mixed beliefs of the community.
2. The issue was rushed through Parliament. The Government was happy to see a contentious issue turn away the public’s attention from its ineffective and dysfunctional governance, and also to hide the Government failures from the newspapers. The Government insisted it have precedence over 200 other important bills which have been waiting for months for debate and approval.
3. Support for gay adoptions was part of an pre-announced program of gay rights. This involved an attack by the Greens on every aspect of Church’s rights and privileges gained over the years, from lapsed Catholics who are disenchanted with the Church’s response, to Catholic priests’ abuse of children in their care, and other secular politicians who wanted to limit the Church based adoption agencies. This attack in the NSW Parliament was continuous, and our efforts to provide exemptions to faith-based adoption agencies occupied hours of vigorous debate resulting in some good amendments. The Assembly will now have to vote again on these issues.
4. The long term agenda expressed by the homosexual community was to establish the legitimacy of gay families through gay adoption, to enable future attempts to gain gay marriage.
5. It was obvious that Church Priests, Ministers and Pastors were uncomfortable in urging their Members to contact their political representatives to vote against this legislation. It seems too many clergy are fearful of criticism in entering into political debate.
6. Conversely individual Church Members do not have the hesitancy of their Church Priests, Ministers and Pastors because letters, emails and telephone calls flooded into the office of every Politician. Many spoke during the debate of the annoyance of this form of lobbying. Most emails came through automatic computers that sent emails every 40 seconds day and night. One company told me it was sending me 30,000 emails. Another said they had 40,000 emails addresses but I do not think they had permission to write on behalf of the owners.
7. Personally, I answered hundreds of these emails with copies of my proposed speech. This resulted in many appreciative responses. My staff replied and read several thousand messages, and replied to each and every one. Many people stated that I was the only Politician who responded, and the only one who straight-out said “No, I will not support this legislation”, and the only one who sent out a copy of my speech. One of my staff suffered from a stress related health breakdown and had to take two weeks rest.
8. Constantly debaters compared the results of bad, abusive, non-caring, alcoholic heterosexual parents, with homosexual and lesbian partners, who were always presented as stable, loving and caring people. The comparisons were usually very one sided and unfair.
9. There was no regard from anyone, to what is known as revealed truth. God’s word is regarded as totally irrelevant. Today’s great values are tolerance, and acceptance of whatever anybody believes is right for them. There is a total disregard and rejection of the authority of the Bible.
10. The deep issue of adoption is always about the rights of the child. The deep issue of gay adoption concerns the rights of adults, to have what they desire. But children are not a commodity to be traded.
11. The number of children available in NSW for adoption is very small – only about twenty per annum.
12. Almost every woman in Parliament in both houses voted for gay adoption rights. Is this representative of women in the community? Certainly the view of hundreds of women who contacted us did not share this view.
13. The so-called conscience vote granted by the major parties is not a privilege appreciated by all Politicians. A number expressed privately that they felt pressured by their party to support their leadership by voting as their leader expressed.
14. There was great interest from the public gallery. Supporters groups from both sides were sighted in the Chamber through both days and nights.
15. The close votes obtained should have led to retaining the status quo. The Government and Clover Moore had no mandate to change fundamental legislation that involved a major social experiment in young lives.
16. Advocates of same sex adoptions and marriage describe themselves as progressive, open minded, enlightened and pressing forward. Those who advocated a mum and a dad as a right for each child were presented as old fashioned, reactionary, and often as religious bigots.
The voting in the Assembly was 46 to 44, and in the Legislative Council was 22/15. Because of amendments made in the Upper House, the Bill will be now sent to the Lower House, the Legislative Assembly, who will have to vote again.
I believe that Christians will be likewise troubled by four more pieces of legislation before Christmas attacking Christian rights and beliefs.
It is time every Christian became active at every level of political involvement, in prayer and financial support.
Write to me and I will tell you how: gordon@gordonmoyes.com
REV HON DR GORDON MOYES AC MLC