Gay wexford: Political

The Struggle So Far
Great work was done at the end of the 1980's and start of the 1990's Ireland still has a long way to go. How long will the members of the GLBT population be treated as second class citizens. We are not criminals, we pay our taxes -
16 years on,- WHY DO WE NOT HAVE EQUAL RIGHTS?
HOMOSEXUALITY DECRIMINALISED IN IRELAND, Dublin, 30th June 1993 - The Irish parliament has passed a law to decriminalise sex between men. The move comes as a result of more than twenty years of campaigning and court actions by the lesbian and gay community.
HOWEVER Equality involes more than marriages being recognised. Gay parents cannot both register, denying the child a legal relationship with one of their parents and creating a whole range of potential problems in later years. Lack of legal recognition of same sex relationships has had implications for LGB people in relation to immigration and residency as administrative arrangements for family reunification have, been based on the family defined by marriage.

This question has been taken from the LGBT Noise website

Simon A Delaney says:
August 24, 2009 at 10:50 pm

What is the source for the statistic quoted in your press release, that”80% of the Irish people agree that same sex couples should be given legal recognition and that over 60% agree that the ban on same sex marriage is discriminatory”?

noise says:
August 25, 2009 at 5:49 pm

Hi Simon,
Thanks for your comment.

We have a section on the website called ‘Poll Data’ containing details of all the polls conducted to date on the issue. It can be found here: http://lgbtnoise.ie/?cat=157

The 84% refers to a poll funded by GLEN and conducted by Lansdowne Market Research. The poll found that ‘84% of those aged 15+ agree that same sex relationships should be given legal recognition’. This was opposed by only 10%. Further details are available on the GLEN website here: http://www.glen.ie/public/research.html

The ‘over 60%’ refers to a recent poll contained in a report called ‘It’s No Joke’. The report was produced by MarriagEquality and published in February 2009. The poll was carried out by Lansdowne Market Research. It found that ‘61% of people believe that denying same sex couples the choice to marry is discriminatory’.

Since 2006, the various polls conducted demonstrate consistent majority support for civil marriage for gay couples and reflect the inherent sense of justice that Irish people possess. NOISE believes that it is time for the government to reflect these views and to take the obvious step of implementing full civil marriage rights for gay couples as has been done already in Spain, Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands, South Africa and Sweden.

A few words on Marriage and Civil Partnership...

Religious Marriage:
This is how different faiths recognise couples within their religion. It's optional. Most couples in Ireland opt for this, but 1 in 5 do not.

Civil Marriage:
This is how the State legally recognises couples, giving them rights, responsibilities and protections.

Civil Partnership:
This is the limited set of rights which the government will allow, possibly this year.

Civil partnership is a law for gay people only.
It says:
   That we are strangers in law to children we raise
   That we and our children cannot even be called a
   family. That gay couples must pay higher taxes.

This law is being written right now, but we still have time to tell the government that we will NOT be second-class citizens! There is only one way to grant equality - through the choice of civil marriage.

SEPARATE IS NEVER EQUAL AND NEVER FAIR!

L G B T Noise