Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise this evening to support the amendment moved by the Leader of the Opposition to the Same-Sex Relationships (Equal Treatment in Commonwealth Laws—Superannuation) Bill 2008. I do so for two reasons: firstly, to support the extension of superannuation to all interdependent relationships and, secondly, to make clear that this bill should not further undermine marriage as conventionally understood in Australia. This bill is about superannuation entitlements. Superannuation in my view is a new form of property. If one looks at the savings of most ordinary Australians, the wealth creation of most ordinary Australians, then for a great many people that major form of savings or wealth creation these days occurs through their superannuation account. If superannuation can today be properly and appropriately characterised as property, then a person ought to have the right to dispose or divest themselves of that property as they can with any other piece of property—be it money they have saved and can buy something with or gift to another person, or real estate, which they can sell or equally gift to another person.

If the government wishes to extend to relationships other than marriage equality of treatment for superannuation purposes, there is no reason as a matter of logic to limit this to relationships based on a same-sex relationship. Why, for example, should two single sisters who have lived together for many years and who provide for each other with financial and domestic support not receive equal treatment with two lesbians in identical circumstances? Or what about a brother and sister? That was the case for some of my relatives, one of whom died recently. In one case the sister’s husband died tragically in the Second World War and her brother has lived with her for the 60-odd years since in an interdependent relationship. Why should they be treated any differently in relation to their property—namely, superannuation—from others? I note that the Attorney-General is at the table. It would be interesting to hear why this bill does not canvass all interdependent relationships, because this was the approach taken by the Howard government in its 2004 amendments to the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act. There was a provision relating to the private sector. The key provision in the act was section 10A(1), which says:

… 2 persons … have an interdependency relationship if:

(a)

they have a close personal relationship; and

(b)

they live together; and

(c)

one or each of them provides the other with financial support; and

(d)

one or each of them provides the other with domestic support and personal care.

If this was a provision which had the unanimous support, as far as I can recall, of the parliament to define an interdependent relationship which would include people in all relationships, whether or not they are on the basis of sexual preference, why should this provision not apply equally to this bill and, as I understand it, to a suite or package of other bills that relate to those in the public sector in Australia? I believe it should apply to people in interdependent relationships. This bill therefore ought to be extended along the lines suggested in the amendment moved by the Leader of the Opposition.

I said secondly that I supported the Leader of the Opposition’s amendments to make clear that the bill should not further undermine marriage as conventionally understood in Australia. In talking of undermining marriage, I quote from Jonathon Sachs in his recent informative book, The home we build together, where he says, ‘The fact that we have deconstructed the family morally, psychologically, economically, politically, is the single most fateful cultural development of our times.’ I certainly believe that that is right.

Other members have spoken about changes of language—‘marital relationships’ to ‘couple relationships’. Does this mean that a marital relationship from a cultural, indeed from a legal, perspective in Australia is seen now as just one other permanent type of relationship that has no special value beyond that? I put this in the context that in 2004 this parliament passed a bill to define marriage as ‘the union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of all others, voluntarily entered into for life’. There is nothing radical in this proposition. It reflected the common-law approach stated by Lord Penzance in the 1866 case of Hyde v Hyde and Woodmansee, namely, that marriage is the voluntary union of one man and one woman, to the exclusion of all others. It was supported by this parliament including the then opposition Labor Party.

That parliamentary action followed decisions and comments by judges in a number of court cases that the traditional understanding could be changed. The Federal Court took this further when it ruled that the common-law test could include psychological and social considerations. In other words, if you consider yourself a man or a woman, that will do! No wonder the overwhelming majority of parliamentarians decided that they and not some unelected judges should determine the boundaries of marriage in Australia. But some want to reverse this long-held view of the majority of Australians. For example, under a proposal by the Greens put to the Senate, I think on the first day of this parliament, marriage means the union of two persons, regardless of their sexuality or gender identity, voluntarily entered into for life.

Missing from their discussion is any consideration of the purpose of marriage. Social science research shows that the optimal way to raise children is in a well-functioning family comprising both a father and a mother. For the Greens, this is all about discrimination. But maintaining that individuals should be able to direct their will, their pension or their superannuation to whomever they wish is different from upholding the very structure upon which society is founded. The Greens and their supporters reject this notion. Hence the latest push to prohibit words such as ‘mother’ and ‘father’ in schools.

Society has an interest in functioning families and healthy children. It has an interest in what Mary Anne Glendon called ‘the seedbeds of virtue’—those structures which enable children to be formed in the virtues. Society has an interest in promoting the institution of marriage because it seeks to unite men and women and to promote child rearing in a setting which provides male and female models. As the demographer Kingsley Davis writes:

The genius of marriage is that, through it, the society normally holds biological parents responsible for each other and for their offspring. By identifying children with their parents and by penalising people who do not have stable relationships, the social system powerfully motivates individuals to settle into a sexual union and take care of ensuing offspring.

David Blankenhorn, the author of Fatherless America, puts the economic consequences succinctly. He said:

No amount of public investment in children can offset the private disinvestment—

arising from dysfunctional families. The Greens are not alone in this retreat from marriage. In New South Wales, the government has legislation before state parliament which would remove the longstanding presumption that a child has one father and one mother, which is the case for the overwhelming majority of children. The reason advanced is to provide day-to-day parenting rights to the non-biological mother of a child conceived to a lesbian couple through artificial reproductive technology. Yet this objective can already be achieved by a Family Court parenting order.

As I understand it, this bill treats all de facto partners of people with children as automatically having a step-parent relationship with their partner’s children, something which only marriage creates today. Accordingly, for the reasons I have set out, I believe it is appropriate for the opposition to refer this matter to a committee. I therefore commend the amendment to the House.

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