Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

As the Treasurer said earlier, our society is absolutely unimaginable without the schools, the hospitals, the employment agencies and the drug and alcohol rehabilitation services that the great Christian charities have provided for hundreds and hundreds of years. And it's their faith that drives them. They do it because of their faith motivation, and part of that faith is that marriage is between a man and a woman, preferably for life and, usually, dedicated to kids.

Once same-sex marriage is enshrined in law, on public policy grounds, organisations that don't recognise same-sex marriage could, indeed, be subject to some kind of official sanction. Overseas, this has happened. Catholic adoption agencies have been forced to withdraw their services. Orthodox Jewish schools have had their funding threatened. American Christian colleges have had registration refused to their law graduates because of their teaching on marriage. Don't think that it can't happen in this country; it already has. I recall, as employment minister, back in 2003 finding a Human Rights Commissioner threatening faith based employment agencies because of their own employment practices. If that threat had been acted upon, they would have had to withdraw their services.

So these amendments are important. I stress: they are not against same-sex marriage. They are simply in favour of the rights of religious organisations to keep doing what they have always done in the great interests of the Australian people.

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