Greens defend their stand on same-sex marriage bill
Ms White was defending her party’s position on Labour’s civil union bill and why it was now opposing a bill that the party endorsed last February.
She echoed the views of the party justice spokesperson Ciarán Cuffe that there is a difference between proposing while in opposition and enacting while in Government.
“While the Labour Party’s proposed bill is broad-ranging, and the spirit of it is progressive, it does not deal with all the complexities which law must cover if it is to survive the test of legal challenges and time.
“Let us remember that rushed legislation is bad legislation. Moreover, a bill on civil partnerships will probably need an accompanying finance bill, which this does not have,” she said.
When the issue came to a vote, the Government’s counter-motion proposing an alternative Civil Partnership Bill (that falls short of allowing same-sex marriage) was passed by a comfortable majority in the House.
Michael D Higgins argued that the Coalition had betrayed same-sex couples. His party leader Eamon Gilmore claimed the Greens were “hopelessly outwitted and outmanoeuvred by the far more experienced Fianna Fáil ministers”.
Mr Gilmore contended: “The commitments they got (in the Programme for Government) are virtually meaningless and are actually a retreat from what was on offer from then Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, back in February last.
“If the Greens were serious about this issue, the least they would have done was to insist that the Government amendment should not block the restoration of the Labour Party Civil Unions Bill to the Order Paper, even if they were not prepared to accept the timetable we had set out for further consideration of its terms. Ironically, if they had done so, it would have greatly strengthened their bargaining position with Fianna Fáil.”
