Mr. Speaker, I have spoken in favour of the bill many times in the House but I want reiterate some important points today. I want to reiterate the fact that this is an issue of equality and an issue of minority rights under the charter. I have spoken clearly about the rights of children and the necessity of passing this bill if we are to give all children equal rights in this country.
I want to make a couple of new points. Currently, we know that 85% of Canadians have the right to same sex marriage in seven provinces and one territory. We also know that if we do not pass the bill we will have to go backwards and do something about those people who have already married, which would mean using the notwithstanding clause. However we believe strongly that using the notwithstanding clause in this case to deny equal rights to a minority group is unacceptable to the government.
Recently in Vancouver I was present where most of the major religious groups, including the Buddhists, the Hindus, the aboriginal communities, the Anglicans, the Catholics, the Unitarians and the United churches, came together to support the bill for a basic reason. If the bill were to pass it would allow them freedom of choice in religious institutions to choose to marry whom they wish. Currently they do not have that choice in some religions.
Two days ago major unions of this country had a press conference in which they talked about the necessity to continue this kind of debate and to bring forward the kind of legislation that the government had promised in its Speech from the Throne that it would follow through on. The unions and the municipalities are all asking us to get on with this and pass the bill. The unions mentioned the bill as being essential and one that was a clear equality right and they wanted to see it passed.
Let us get on with the work of doing good governance in the House and bringing about good public policy, not fooling around as we have been doing in the past while.