When Judith Collins was appointed Justice Minister, lobby group Rainbow Wellington wrote to her asking her position on various issues, including same-sex marriage. Her response? She's just not interested:
The Government has no plans to introduce same-sex marriage in the current Parliamentary term. As you are aware, there is considerable diversity of opinion on same-sex marriage.Or, translated, "there are bigots and National wishes to pander to them".
Not that this is any real surprise. Collins is a bigot, and a dishonest one at that. She voted against civil unions and the Relationships (Statutory References) Act in 2004 and 2005 - supposedly on the grounds that we should be having a debate on same-sex marriage instead. She then turned around and voted to ban same-sex marriage later that year. I think that record speaks for itself. And sadly, the National Party is full of people like her, too cowardly even to state their real position, but blocking progress and impeding the full realisation of human rights. Which means that progress just isn't going to happen under a National government.
