The intense gay lobby is still furious that Labor has declared a conscience vote on same-sex marriage, and Tony Abbott probably is just as angry. But from that point, the two camps divide.
Tell us the truth, Tony! Photo: The Australian.
The Opposition is under no obligation - moral or political - to allow its MPs a conscience vote on same-sex marriage just because Labor needed to approve one to rescue Julia Gillard’s authority.
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott would be perfectly entitled, should his shadow cabinet back him, to tell his troops the Coalition would have a fixed position which all would be asked to support. And it is likely that position would be one of total rejection.
Labor has allowed a conscience vote because that was essential to making sure the Prime Minister was not humiliated by an out-of-control issue at the ALP National Conference.
The compromise involving changes to the party platform to allow gay marriage, but insistence it be a conscience vote was hailed as a Gillard triumph of issue management.
Tony Abbott doesn’t include himself in the Gillard support group, and quite possibly will snub any attempt for him to follow Labor’s lead. His comments yesterday pointed in that direction.
“There’s a sense in which every vote in the Liberal Party is a conscience vote because we don’t expel people for exercising their judgment, unlike the Labor Party,” he said in Brisbane.
His argument was that all votes are free for Liberal MPs to exercise according to their personal priorities, with no directions shoved down their necks. This didn’t explain the need for five conscience votes under the Government of John Howard, and in other ways was not a satisfactory answer to the direct question he was asked on whether he would grant a free vote to his MPs.
Abbott was never going to give a complete answer despite repeated opportunities.
“Look, as I said - and I think probably I will have said all I can say on this when I finished answering this question - but every vote that the Liberal Party takes in the Parliament is essentially a conscience vote because we don’t expel people as the Labor Party does for exercising their judgment.
“If legislation comes before the parliament, as it’s expected to, it will go through our party room process and everyone will have the opportunity to say his or her piece then. Are there any other subjects?”
QUESTION: “Is that a yes or no then on the conscience vote?”
TONY ABBOTT: “I think I’ve answered that one pretty fully.”
He hadn’t answered it fully at all. And Grant Tambling, a former senator, might contest the depiction of an endlessly tolerant Liberal Party made by Abbott.
Tambling, from the Country Liberal Party, the Northern Territory’s version of the Liberals, lost endorsement for the 2001 election because he crossed the floor to vote against internet gambling n the territory. It wasn’t a conscience vote.
Tony Abbott could early next year cause Julia Gillard big problems on marriage equality if he can keep his side disciplined, and limit the number who might cross the floor on the matter, probably three or four.
Many more than three or four Labor MPs would consider using their free vote to oppose gay marriage, possibly enough to combine with the bulk of Liberals to defeat the legislation in the House of Representatives.
Julia Gillard might then have a revolt by the simmering gay lobby with demands the conscience vote provision be lifted.
Tony Abbott might not need much prodding.
It was a conscience vote which in 2006 robbed him of his power as Health Minister over the abortion drug RU486. He was against its sale.
He voted against that amendment, just as he voted against a human cloning bid in 2007 in another conscience vote.
These two votes demonstrated the potential for floor crossing and how no single party has a monopoly on any single, major cultural or social issue.
While Abbott opposed both, Kevin Rudd opposed cloning but not the move to accept RU486.
Julia Gillard and Malcolm Turnbull supported both.
via: http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/abbott-cant-give-a-straight-answer-on-gay...
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