The Silence of the Latham

Dear Mr Latham

I notice with some interest that you yourself have not said anything, either in public or in private, on the issue of gay rights and in particular the marriage issue. I do not know whether this comes from personal disinterest, or simply an attempt to concentrate public attention of the issue of the PBS and the FTA.

It seems to me that this position leaves you some room to manoeuvre on the issue: you can always censure Ms Roxon for exceeding her brief, especially her action in cosying up to the extreme right wing Christian fundamentalist Taliban minority who make up the self-style National Marriage Forum, whose entire agenda is diametrically opposed to everything an egalitarian Labor Party is supposed to stand for.

I assume you are aware of their links with Bob Santamaria'’s old gang, who want to put women back in the home and the kitchen, end the influence of feminism, make divorce next-to-impossible . . . . . well, you get the general idea. You can hardly be happy at Ms. Roxon's tying the Labor party to this toxic bunch of thinly-disguised white supremacists and fascists. Or can you?

Within the aforementioned room to manouvre you could always play the same kind of counter-wedging card that you have over the FTA -– that is, put forward a marriage act amendment of your own rather than accept Mr Howards. This could enshrine the cherished Labor value of equality for all, perhaps by establishing civil unions open to all, as an alternative to both de facto relationships and marriage, along the lines of the French Pactes Civiles.

This would be an acceptable temporary compromise for the GLBT community, as well as getting you off the current hook, where you are being forced into a position of enshrining inequality and discrimination. You could - and should -– make a powerful civil and human rights case for such a move, whilst avoiding the dreaded m-word, which seems to be like a red rag to a bull.

Believe me, so long as the unions are marriage in all but name, most of us don'’t care what you call it. And as I said, I feel sure the GLBT community would accept something a bit less as a temporary measure. What will not be forgiven is enshrining anti-gay inequality and discrimination in law. Already most voting gays of whom I am aware - and that'’s quite a few - – talk of voting Green or Democrat first, and preferencing Labor last, even behind the Coalition, if you persist in this course.

One of Ms Roxons minions - she did not have the courtesy to write to me herself -– has issued a bland statement containing a neat piece of moral blackmail which says, in effect, vote for us or you'’ll get the Coalition next time, and therefore nothing. She misses the point that this pernicious bill will by then be law, and therefore we will have already lost. We therefore have nothing to lose now.

You have a well-deserved reputation for standing up for the minorities and the underdogs, and also for finding escape hatches from seemingly impossible corners Mr Howard tries to back you in to. I would ask you please to display the same qualities in this instance and prevent this evil piece of law from being enacted.