Barnett Tim: Civil Union Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Barnett Tim: Civil Union Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Volume:622;Page:17479] 
TIM BARNETT (Labour—Christchurch Central) 
: 
 Thank you very much indeed for choosing me to speak Madam Chairperson; I almost regret your doing that as I was looking forward to hearing from Bill English. I was pleased to read only 2 years ago when he was interviewed as the then National Party leader at the last election that he was in support of the concept of civil unions. I do not quite know what has happened in the last 2 years. 
A number of people have asked about the difference between marriage and civil union. I am not someone who has ever expressed an intention to civil unionise although I am one of the members of the House who might choose that option when the legislation goes through. But I was just thinking through how different this would be. First of all of course just to respond to Maurice Williamson who wants the law to leave people to make their own choices I have never had the choice of marriage open to me unless I were to choose to marry a woman which would probably not be the most successful of relationships. Therefore there is an option that has been denied to me. 
Civil union opens up an option. Having done that and the State has forced me to live in sin for the 3½ years of my relationship I can go through a process leading up to civil union which in a legal sense is quite similar to a marriage except that I do not have to find a marriage celebrant; I have to find a civil union celebrant. The fee for a civil union will be about twice as much as the fee for a marriage therefore I will have to pay a bit more for the privilege. 
Then I think about the culture. For someone going into a marriage there are traditions about the bride’s parents funding the food at the marriage and the bridegroom’s parents funding the alcohol and the location of the wedding tends to be where the bride’s family live so there is a whole new culture that would develop around a same-sex couple going through a civil union. The culture and the traditions are different. This is a new institution a 21st century institution and a whole new approach. 
The ceremony also means something very different. Think of the couples who have been together for much longer than myself and my partner for 20 or 30 years in a same-sex relationship who have been denied the ability to marry and denied the ability to go through a single legal recognition process. There is a whole history there that will be reflected in that ceremony. Nowadays most people going into marriage have lived together for a time but probably not for 10 20 or 30 years. That is quite a different ceremony quite a different culture and quite a different tradition. 
That is what a civil union is all about. It is an institution that is open to heterosexual and same-sex couples. This institution has the language of a civil relationship and of a union rather than the language of marriage attached to it. I would be very clear were I to go through a civil union that I would not be entering a gay marriage. I would be entering into a civil union—a legal recognition process that was for me and also for my heterosexual friends a united process absolutely separate from marriage. 
What is extraordinary about this debate is that suddenly members of this Parliament are coming out as opposed in principle to marriage and Stephen Franks and Maurice Williamson in the last few minutes have indicated that they do not think we should have marriage at all. Then we heard Judith Collins and Tariana Turia say that unless we have full same-sex marriage they would not support it. So we have an extraordinary action of people dancing on the head of a pin in order to avoid dealing with the obvious issue. 
Some people argue as Maurice Williamson just did that we can deal with it all by a whole series of legal documents. A couple can draw up an enduring power of attorney a property relationships agreement in a will and suddenly out of that a couple has celebrated a relationship. Clearly those are not actions of celebration; they are purely actions of protection. But also as all members know having received a letter not too long ago from a gay couple living in Wellington even if a couple goes through all that they do not have the same level of legal protection as they do on entering into marriage or a civil union. So the civil union concept is a very simple straightforward and cost-effective way for a couple to protect their relationship. 
At the end of the day this is all about whether someone like myself and my partner whom I am in love with should be treated in broadly the same way in law as Dail Jones and his wife should be treated. People in the lesbian and gay communities are not asking for marriage they are asking for just some of those elements and I think that is very well delivered in the civil union legislation.