In the United States, one major recent issue for LGBT Americans dealt with "religious liberty"...or, to use its real provenance, service provider discrimination. This isn't likely to become a major issue in New Zealand at any point, primarily because we had those debates in the early nineties. New Zealand isn't a federal jurisdiction, so our national Human Rights Act 1993 applied to sexual orientation and other additional grounds, safeguarding lesbians, gay men and bisexuals against discrimination on the basis of accomodation, employment and service provision. The metaphorical boat sailed long ago on that front. During the committee stage of the Marriage Equality Act 2013, though, National MP Tim McIndoe sought to introduce Supplementary Order Paper 203 into the legislation. This would have widened the "right" to service provider discrimination to encompass anyone with a religious social conservative bias within a secular occupational category who plead "conscience"- bakers, hotel owners, caterers, wedding photographers and anyone else. Unsurprisingly, it was defeated heavily (80-36). That didn't stop Family First carping about it, although the Conservative Party kept well away from it during last years New Zealand election in September 2014. Given the paralysis of the Conservative Party at present, the only possible avenue is through New Zealand First, depending whether or not Winston Peters wants to adopt it as an issue. Although Peters is sympathetic to religious social conservatism, he is also not past dumping social conservative MPs if they prove embarrassments, as happened with Asenati Lole-Taylor over questions about her conduct toward other NZF party members and subsequent police investigations after her dumping. In the United States, matters are somewhat different. There is no nationwide anti-discrimination legislation, although the Employment Non-Discrimination Act has been awaiting the existence of a progay majority in the federal House of Representatives and Senate to move it along for many years. Instead, LGBT Americans have to rely on a patchwork of state-based antidiscrimination laws. Many US states do prohibit sexual orientation discrimination on the basis of accomodation- these include Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Indiana, Illinois, Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, the District of Columbia, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and Puerto Rico. These are trans-inclusive- however, Wisconsin, New Hampshire and New York state reserve it for sexual orientation alone. As for employment discrimination, even more of a mosaic exists- both sexual orientation and gender identity are protected in Washington state, Oregon, California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Minnesota, Indiana, Illinois, the District of Columbia, Vermont, Massachusetts, Maine, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland and Hawaii. Wisconsin, Alaska, Montana, Missouri, Ohio and New Hampshire only protect lesbians, gays and bisexuals, while New York state only protects lesbians, gay men and bisexuals in government employment. Bewildering as the above patchwork is, several US states have tried to erode LGBT rights to freedom from service provider discrimination through the subterfuge of "religious liberty" legislation after several cases in more enlightened jurisdictions prohibited service provider discrimination from fundamentalist hotel owners, caterers, photographers, public registrars and other secular occupations due to their religious beliefs, against engaged same-sex couples. Consequently, more backward US states decided to legislate for service provider discrimination under that euphemism. In Spring 2015, North Carolina, Kentucky, Lousiana and Indiana sought to draft service provider exemption laws under the 'religious liberty' euphemism. In Indiana, Republican Governor Mike Pence found that there was substantial backlash against that state's service provider discrimination laws, Walmart, NASCAR and the National Council on Alcohol and Addiction threatened to withdraw business and operational activities from the state. However, and worryingly, many of the Republican aspirants for presidential nomination supported service provider discrimination "rights"- such as Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Scott Walker, Mario Rubio, Rick Perry, Bobby Jindal and Mike Huckabee. Much of the aggressive litigation and legislative lobbying carried out to sanction service discrimination under the rubric of "religious liberty restoration" legislation has been orchestrated by the "Alliance Defending Freedom," a conservative Catholic litigation group. In the United Kingdom, the United Kingdom Independence Party and Democratic Unionist Party also backed such legislation but neither hold the balance of power and UKIP has only a sole House of Commons MP after May 7's election. However, as the Indiana debacle showed, such measures are on the backfoot in the United Kingdom, as few people believe that these desperate 'religious liberty' subterfuges are anything more than whitewashing service provision discrimination against potential LGBT clients. One can only wonder why New Zealand antigay Christian Right activists like Family First's Bob McCoskrie are lauding such failed tactics in New Zealand. Recommended: Chadwick Moore: "The Backlash" Advocate: 27.04.2015: http://www.advocate.com/politics/religion/2015/04/27/how-religious-right-conspiring-put-discrimination-back-law?page=0,1 Craig Young - 5th June 2015