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Christian Heritage calls for CU repeal

Fri 29 Apr 2005 In: New Zealand Daily News

Less than a week after the Civil Union Act became law, a political party has announced their intention to get it repealed after this year's, stripping same-sex couples of legal rights. Christian Heritage New Zealand, the former party of convicted child molester Graham Capill, announced today it was important that the new parliament be given an opportunity to reverse the Act “as soon as possible”. Leader Ewen McQueen says the party will do whatever it can to create such an opportunity. "We are not going to stand by and let civil unions become an accepted part of the New Zealand cultural and moral landscape," he said in a press statement. "As well as giving official sanction to homosexuality, this legislation undermines what marriage has represented for centuries." Green Party associate justice spokesperson Metiria Turei says civil unions are about justice, not morality. "It's not a question about morality or moral standards,” she told GayNZ.com. "This is about a society where the law should apply to everyone equally. We'll be campaigning hard to remind people that we are a modern, progressive society not a Stone Age one." Turei says there are very few people in New Zealand who don't have a gay or lesbian person in their lives that they know and love. “It's easy for oppponents of civil unions to drive up the sense that we're talking about 'other kinds of people', but we're talking about our own sons and our own daughters." Rather than defending their support of civil unions, the Greens say they consider it a proud achievement of their time in Parliament. “We supported it as a matter of policy, because the whole of our party is behind us,” she says. "It's a fantastic thing that the law has been changed. When we achieve anything like this we need to congratulate ourselves and take pride in that achievement, and then continue to work for what is completely just."    

Credit: GayNZ.com News Staff

First published: Friday, 29th April 2005 - 12:00pm

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