Today, as was envisaged, Bill Shorten’s Labor party voted to block the Same Sex Marriage (SSM) plebiscite legislation. Given the Labor parties many years of advocating SSM for Australia does it come at any surprise that they would be against allowing the general populous to give their combined opinion on the topic?
To answer this question you have to take into consideration that Labor, under Julia Gillard, during her reign of terror, had the balance of power to do the deed and legislate what ever they wanted the law to be. So why not then?
The first reason is they did not want to. In this day and age it is good politics to be seen going to bat for the minorities. So it makes sense to keep the homosexuals supporting you, by supporting their cause. The second is, since the Labor Party is basically a puppet of the Union movement, SSM is not high on their agenda.
So fast forward to today. A plebiscite on the issue of SSM. You would think that a Political Party which claims to be “Progressive” would jump at the chance, to once and for all, show those naysayers that the majority of the country supports SSM. But no, the exact opposite is true. If the plebiscite is successful they lose their faux outrage point. If the plebiscite is unsuccessful then it shows how out of touch with the electorate they really are.
Now, The arguments that they are using to justify their current position ie preferring a parliamentary vote over the plebiscite don’t hold any water either. Firstly because, when in office, they failed to do it themselves when they had the numbers and secondly to save money, please don’t make me laugh, this is the Australian Labor Party (ALP) we are talking about here.
If anything is to be taken away from the grubby games the ALP play is it’s best not to have them on your side.
