It’s not easy for a party with no MPs to get into parliament.
The Maori and Mana Parties managed it in by-elections but their candidates had just resigned to stand under a new banner. NZ First got lucky at the last election but it and, more significantly for its supporters, its leader had been there before.
A party with neither at least one MP nor a previous term in parliament has yet to win a seat in an election.
But Patrick Gower thinks Labour MP Louisa Walls might have improved the chances of the Conservative Party doing that.
. . . On the other hand, Key and National may want to look liberal; the party has just taken up the idea of same-sex adoption. Going for the bill could help Key in the centre-ground.
And that, of course, would open up room on the right for, guess who? The Conservatives leader Colin Craig. . .
Rob Hosking has a similar thought:
New Zealanders are increasingly liberal on the issue of gay marriage – the National Party conference, which, pretty much by definition, is one of the country’s more conservative bodies, voted last weekend in favour of gay adoption.
And various polls show a fair majority of New Zealanders polled are in favour of allowing gay marriage. . .
I was at a marriage celebrants’ education forum yesterday. Walls’ Bill came up during a panel discussion, none of the panelists had any objection and the body language of the audience suggested theyw ere reflecting the views of the majority of the audience.
But a small but significant chunk of New Zealand voters march to a different drum.
One poll, in the run up to the 2008 election, showed that about 15% of New Zealanders polled would consider voting for a Christian-based party. . .
It is not too difficult to see a Christian-based party pulling in some churchgoing Labour voters, especially from the Pasifika community.
Mr Craig is already campaigning hard on the issue. It is a gift from Heaven for his party, and his party’s approach to politics is much more aligned with that of National than of Labour. . .
Craig has been pilloried for saying that it is “not intelligent to pretend that homosexual relationships are normal”.
He’d need a far more intelligent argument than that to change the minds of people who aren’t opposed to the idea of liberalising marriage laws but those aren’t the voters he’s chasing.
His party is Conservative by name and it’s moral conservatives whose votes he’s after.
Walls’ Bill could make it a lot easier for him to get them.
Homepaddock 
This is a symptom of a culture that has lost its mind.
What is so hard to grasp that if people don’t have children and raise them well then that society collapses?
This is not rocket science.
And marriage is at its very heart about procreating and raising the next generation not about who you F**K!!!!!!!
But then again we live in a culture that hates children, after all we murder 17000 of the a year in our public hospitals so why not promote unnatural unions that wont produce babies to murder.
Boy people are too dumb to see the judgement that is going to come upon us all.
And perhaps I was dumb to invest my adult life in raising mine instead of indulging in self indulgent sexual hedonism and living the high life
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Hopefully, a worthy fallout will be to show true classical liberals that a vote for the Conservatives is a trade not worth making, as it merely replaces the Left’s theocracy of state, with the theocracy of a bigot.
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I suppose a true conservative view on the subject could be gleaned from these two viewpoints..
There’s the story of the English noblewoman who was asked about some aspect of sexuality and replied: “They can do it in the street for all I care; so long as they don’t frighten the horses”.
And:
(1st Captain) Reggie’s been cashiered for having sex with a horse”
(2nd Captain) “With the big stallion of his?”
(1st Captain) “Oh good Lord no, our Reggie’s no queer!”
My own view is indifference, except I find it distasteful to call it “marriage” when by meaning, purpose and tradition it plainly is not.
JC
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Marriage !!.. I now declare you ???..
Marriage !!.. Which one wears the White Gown.??.
Marriage !!. Which one is declared Wife ??.
Civil Union is out there for all to recognize. ..
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I can’t believe I missed all these comments… and i’m astounded by them. The marriage equality bill seeks to clarify the legal definition of marriage. It does not seek to infringe on the right of the church(es) to undertake marriage as a sacrament of their respective church. It will make no difference to churches, or to heterosexual couples who are or aren’t married.
The ‘purpose’ of marriage has many different flavours and has evolved over time including before the church celebrated marriage as a sacrament. It is down to the individual how they view their own marriage and why they choose to get married.
It is not the role of the state to interfere in a persons ability to choose who they wish to marry or whether they choose to have children. Society has come a long way since the creation of the marriage act 1955- for context in 1955 it were still legal to rape a woman as long as she was your wife- while this is a horrible example from our past I feel it provides some context as to how archaic this law actually is. While this might be a change that those on the more socially conservative end of the spectrum will find it hard to adjust to, that is no reason to deny a few citizens the right that the majority already have.
As for the civil unions argument- a civil union is not the same, an heterosexual couples can choose to have a marriage OR a civil union, homosexual couples don’t get that choice. Saying a civil union is the same as a marriage could be likened to apartheid.-By saying a suburb of a city only for blacks is the same as the one for whites, except white people can choose to live in whichever one they want. Marriage also comes with the ability to call your spouse your husband or wife and the ability to adopt a child as a couple- something gay parents can only do as in individual under the status quo.
There is no place in New Zealand for the preservation of discriminatory law.
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