Prime Minister David Cameron and Chancellor George Osbourne are both personally committed to legalizing same-sex marriage but numerous members of the Conservative Party have voiced plans to vote against it.
According to The Telegraph, 121 out of 303 Conservative Members of Parliament are “uneasy” about the issue, as collated by the lobby group Coalition for Marriage (C4M). Among the 121 MPs opposed to the legislation is openly gay MP and close friend of Maggie Thatcher Conor Burns, who claims there is “no clamour for this at all within the gay community.”
C4M’s director Colin Hart, said:
“We welcome the 121 MPs who have so far said that they think the plans are wrong and will have serious consequences. We know that the more MPs and members of the public hear about the Government proposals the concerned they are and the more people want these plans stopped. This issue has never been put before the British public and increasingly MPs realise that it is simply undemocratic to force this through.”
Cameron and Osbourne, however, remain steadfast, inspired by same-sex marriage victories in the US as well as President Barack Obama‘s support of it.
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“It is worth reflecting that in Britain, as in America, a clear majority of the public support gay marriage, and an even bigger majority of women support it,” Osbourne wrote in The Times. “Successful political parties reflect the modern societies they aspire to lead. As Margaret Thatcher said in the first sentence of her introduction to the 1979 Conservative election manifesto: ‘The heart of politics is not political theory, it is people and how they want to live their lives’.”
Ministers plan on introducing a bill by 2015, but Cameron reportedly has plans to fast-track legislation and bring the bill to Parliament early next year.
2eo
The only reason they’re getting this much resistance is because of our ridiculous cultural bias towards the church of England, with them having dozens of representative, while us atheists, the moral intelligent majority of our nation don’t even get one lord or say.
This isn’t even an issue, except to the pig headeds, same as America.
alexoloughlin
This doesn’t mean anything. I looked at the list of 118 (not 121) of Tory MPs who say they are voting no, but there are some on the list, an erroneous one at that, who will be voting yes. Typical Telegraph and Hate Mail spin, no facts.
So what, who cares if they vote against it, it will still win. A whipped vote for Labour and Liberal Democrats, roughly 311 votes right there and only 326 needed to pass, plus 187 or more Tories voting yes. 118 or 121 is not a large or significant number either to worry about.
At least we’re not seeing demonstrations against it as we’ve seen in France where opposition is a lot more vocal and physical. There hasn’t been one country where marriage equality is legal that fierce opposition hasn’t ensued. It was expected and this too is no different. A storm in a tea cup in the UK case.
Freddie27
@alexoloughlin: Agreed. This measure is guaranteed to pass with the two massive other parties that Queerty failed to mention being centre-left and hugely supportive as well as a large number, but not all, of Conservative MP’s, including my one! No public demonstrations of the sort that have occurred in France have happened either. Most people are generally supportive/indifferent.