Civil Partnership for Gays: Breakthrough or Discrimination?

* CiaranCuffe Called down to GLEN, and gave them a fresh off the presses copy of the Civil Partnerships Bill
* dermod http://glen.ie/about/history.html
@lgbtnoise @marriagequality Does GLEN have the support now of lgbt organisations? Who does GLEN represent?
* dermod @CiaranCuffe @rodericogorman It might be useful to establish who exactly GLEN represents now. Not me.
* CiaranCuffe @ dermod Fair enough. Maybe you’d drop into the Dáil for a coffee and we’ll discuss what next needs to be done
* dermod is ashamed of GLEN’s “strong welcome” to the Inequality Bill http://bit.ly/4gyZ2
* CiaranCuffe @ dermod neither FF nor FG support full equality
* dermod @ CiaranCuffe I can’t believe you just said that

The day after the Civil Partnership Bill was published, I was very angry. It wasn’t the fact that an imperfect Bill had been produced. I knew that the Greens had put in a lot of hard work to get Fianna Fáil to produce any sort of Bill at all, given the fact that Dermot Ahern had actually opposed decriminalisation of homosexuality in 1993.

No, what made me mad was the fact that, once the Bill had been published, the obscenity of the fact that this law would formalise inequality was not given due recognition by those who I thought stood for equality. The unelected Gay and Lesbian Equality Network – aka GLEN – “strongly welcomed” the Bill in a statement on their website. This really annoyed me, because it’s one thing to work hard to push for progressive reform, it’s quite another to swallow legalised inequality in the eyes of the law and welcome it. Decriminalisation in Ireland in 1993 was a triumph because the Minister at the time introduced equality, pure and simple. And that was a Fianna Fáil minister. Ciarán Cuffe, TD, Green Party spokesman on Justice, on the Green Party website, had said that he was “delighted” with the Bill. As a gay Green Party member, this was a red rag to a bull.

I wore a T-shirt at Pride saying I was ashamed of GLEN’s “strong welcome” to the “Inequality Bill”. After the Twitter exchange above with Ciarán Cuffe, we met for coffee and had this conversation.

CIARAN CUFFE: The Civil Partnership Bill is a good case history of what we’re trying to do in government. I’d like to talk a little bit of where all this came from, and to give my own side of the story. In 2006 a small group of us got together in the Green party to put together what we called a marriage policy. You could sum it up in one word, which was equality. There’s not much to it, either you have equality or you don’t.

DERMOD MOORE: Exactly.

Although within the Greens, there was a certain amount of gnashing of teeth, nevertheless Roderic O’Gorman wrote what I think is a very good and decent policy. So, we sat down two years ago to formulate the programme for government, which was an awful lot of Fianna Fáil’s election manifesto, and a few little bits of ours, which is probably in the kind of proportions you get when there are 80 Fianna Fáil TDs and 6 Green TDs. And within that Programme, there was a commitment to legislate along the lines of the Colley Report. During the first year there was a fair amount of sitting down with groups like GLEN, and then MarriagEquality came into being. I stood up at a meeting on Marriage Equality a couple of years ago going “the thing that you have to do is to sit down with your local TDs and Senators and look them in the eye and say ‘I and my partner want to get married. Civic Marriage, full marriage’”. I said that as strongly as I could.

Only one couple sat down in my clinic in Dun Laoghaire and said that to me. Anecdotally, Brian Lenihan, whom I met a few times over civil partnership, said to me only “one couple came in to me”. And I’m kind of pissed off about that, because it’s a huge issue, an important issue, and deserved the strength of a real lobby, not just sending a quick email in. It takes time and effort and a real leap of faith to go through into the strange clientelist world of lobbying your local politician. It’s a space that most of us don’t exist in. Most of us don’t come to see our politician unless there’s a crisis. And in the froth of new media and blogs and twitter and all of that, it’s very easy to tweet that this is my view. The getting down and dirty and moving a political issue isn’t easy. I was moving this issue forward in the All-Party Oireachtas Group on the Constitution, and we went through turgid meetings on family rights, and produced something the thickness of a telephone directory. But within those stale committee meetings it became very clear that there is a very conservative streak in the Oireachtas.

It came down at one stage in a discussion about the very early part of the constitution, which talks about the family, the protection of the family based on marriage. I, with Aongus Ó Snodaigh of Sinn Féin and Jan O’Sullivan of Labour, argued very strongly that you need to not only protect Marriage, but needed to protect the Family. They wouldn’t go for it. They would only protect the Family based on Marriage. This is at a time when a third of births in Ireland are outside of marriage, but the collective view of that committee was such that they wouldn’t even think about the family that isn’t based on marriage. I mean I have a typical non-nuclear family, I have two step-kids, I’ve two kids myself, and me and my partner are not married. Families aren’t made the way they used to be. So, that’s another aspect.

Meanwhile, you have Senator Jim Walsh, expressing a strong view at the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party saying that Civil Unions shouldn’t be allowed. So, in that context, I regard it as a pretty good day to get the Civil Partnership Bill published, and hopefully get enacted within the next six months. If I felt that there was a touch of collective commitment from Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil to move further than that, I’d say “Great, let’s stop the whole thing, and get further approval”. But, very often, in a small party, you’re not going to get everything that you look for, you get movement in the right direction. And it’s in that context that I tweeted you and said ‘Look, even if the government changed tomorrow, it would be very hard to get Fine Gael to get beyond their tacit dipping-their-toe-in-the-water attitude of ‘Oh I’ll deal with the Labour Party bill on the basis that we’re not dealing with the full bill here’.

But Fine Gael don’t have a marriage policy, as far as I know, they’ve never put time into this issue, and I really doubt that there would be any prospect of moving to full equality with Fine Gael, with an alternative coalition in there.

I understand and appreciate all that. I also realise that this Bill originated two years ago. Things have changed. In particular, the Ryan report. More than ever, there’s an awareness of the need to separate church from state. From my perspective, Catholic values are what are preventing equality in this Bill.

I agree.

There’s also the fact that 61% of people in Ireland, according to the MarriagEquality poll, believe that to deny gay people civil marriage is a form of discrimination.

That’s two years old now.

It’s even more now, and has grown with successive polls. My concern is two-fold. One is that I think it’s an obscenity in 2009/10, in Ireland, we are going to introduce a bill that formalises inequality. The fact that the Greens are party to that is an embarrassment to me.

I respect your view.

I also think that GLEN, as a non-elected body, who have done Trojan work on this, have got caught up in themselves, and haven’t realised how the mood has changed. After all their (and your) hard work, the Civil Partnership Bill was torn up to cheers in front of thousands of people at Dublin Pride.

A parade is a parade. And twenty long committee meetings, trying to move...

I understand, you’re talking realpolitik-

This is real politics. And I can say that about almost any area of my work.

But my problem as a Green Party member is that the Greens will die by the next election unless some voice is expressed that is somehow based on ideals.

I have consistently said that this does not go far enough. Our policy remains.

Where is the squeal of outrage about inequality?

Front page of the Irish Times last Friday, it carried a report “Greens say this bill doesn’t go far enough”.

But on the Green Party website, you say you are “delighted”. The word “delighted” comes through, more than “It doesn’t go far enough”. That’s such a difference in tone. You’re talking real politics but people want much more than that. There’s a disillusionment with politics at least among my circle. Especially with the Greens.

If that manifested to me in people saying to me “Make this happen!”

I’m saying that.

OK, that’s one. There’s been a dozen, half a dozen vitriolic emails saying “how dare you say that this is a step forward.” But behind all of that...

Well I’ve not been vitriolic and in this column I’ve not been critical yet of the Greens. But unless something is voiced that is different to what I’ve been hearing, there’s not going to be a Green Party by the next election.

This is the issue of being in government. There is a guy out there giving out about the Greens for not banning hunting. We’d like to do that, but Fianna Fáil would not. “Talk to fucking Fianna Fáil!” is my answer to that.

Right, but where is the difference to be seen? Where is the friction?

Friction does not manifest with a guy with a megaphone outside the Dáil every week. It’s manifested in long turgid committee meetings that go on for hour after hour after hour, that maybe are seen occasionally making it into the national media, or making it into blogs etc

But in this day and age, haven’t you realised that people are crying out for idealists?

I am an idealist! I have a policy, I defend that policy! Movement in the right direction worth welcoming.

I understand that. Look, I’ve been a passionate supporter of the Green movement ever since I saw Petra Kelly speak in the 1970s. I am saying that I am frightened that the Greens will die at the next election, because there’s nothing at the moment to differentiate you from Fianna Fáil-

But there is! There’s a whole fucking website full of policies!

But it’s more than just policies and committees! That’s my point.

There’s the headlines on the front of the Irish Times saying “Greens say the bill doesn’t go far enough”. I mean what do I do? Chain myself to the gates of Leinster House? That doesn’t change the legislation, one person jumping up on the gatehouse. What changes it is the long, hard work. I’m engaged in that process. Lobbying isn’t easy. Lobbying is more than a crowd-pleasing move at Pride 2009! It’s about systemic engagement with the backwoods conservatives in Fianna Fáil. How many people have sat down in front of Martin Mansergh and said “I want civil marriage”?

Well, I’m not responsible for his constituents. All I can speak to is my sense that how the Greens see Ireland in the future, those values and ideals, are not being expressed clearly enough. You don’t need to chain yourself to the railings...

It’s about public perception.

Exactly. It’s not just crowd-pleasing, you’ve used that as a dismissive phrase. My perception is that you’ve certainly got engrossed in the business of politics and I’m sure you can point out to this clause, that clause, that you’ve been responsible for.

And that takes an awful lot out of me, and I’ve been in the Greens for twenty-seven years, and God knows that isn’t easy!

Of course not.

I was being dismissive in the sense that it’s easy to be a big fish in a small pond. It’s easy to please a group of ten thousand people at the Civic Offices. It’s more difficult to win over the Fianna Fáil T.D. for South Tipperary or North Leitrim. But that’s where change is necessary.

Of course. People have been lamenting the fact that the “vision thing” has been absent in Ireland. I had hoped that gay marriage would be the issue that sparked it, where something like a flare would come up from the Green Party that said “actually, we have a different vision of the future”. It’s worth making explicit just how difficult it is dealing with Fianna Fáil. In other words, make friction! Unless there are some principled stands made, the Greens will disappear at the next election.

Well we do create friction, but maybe it’s not loud enough.

It’s nowhere near loud enough!

We are going through a process, going back to the Programme for Government, reviewing it with our members, and very strongly saying “This is what needs to change.”

The problem is that goodwill towards the Greens has evaporated. I mean preferences towards Green candidates just disappeared in the local elections. Dublin’s councillors have gone.

I know! That’s a huge loss.

But don’t you see why?

It’s because we had the audacity to go into government.

And – seemingly, to have bought into the system.

And, look what we’ve delivered! We have –

Look, you don’t need to list –

You know the successes we’ve achieved in government

Yes, I do.

Perhaps, we need to be talking more loudly about them. But even if we do talk more loudly about them, that’s rarely the issue when it comes to being asked for media commentary.

So, you have to set your own agenda. Re-energise! There’s something wrong if you can accept inequality in a Bill and say it’s a step forward, despite the fact that more than 60% of people in Ireland approve of gay Civil Marriage in several polls over several years.

Look, I take the point that we need to be more strident about what our vision is.

And not be seen to be swallowed up! The tweet you sent me, referring to Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael not being for equality, – I thought “you’re missing the point”.

You probably feel that not having this is better than having it. I don’t.

I don’t.

Revolutions rarely happen overnight. They happen by degrees. Racial equality in the US, you could argue, still has not happened, but it took many small advances to move things along throughout the 1960s.

What shocked me, about GLEN’s position in particular, and the Greens as well, was that, after all the Trojan work it took to get things this far, no one was saying “the monstrous flaw about this Bill is that we are introducing inequality here, which is a matter of pain to us, and yet we support it.”

And we all should be saying it’s only one small step. But I do think it’s a major step on the road to full equality. I really do, when you look at what some of the backwoodsmen are saying, it’s a major step. In some States it’s taken 25 years to go from Civil Partnership to marriage, in some countries they’ve gone all the way to full marriage almost overnight, as they did in Spain. But there’s been a huge amount of heavy lifting that’s been a lot more difficult to do, for GLEN or for the Green Party, than it is to comment on whether this represents equality or inequality.

But I’d love the honesty of you just saying “this is such heavy work”.

I use the phrase “blood, sweat and tears”. And it is, to go in there, in June, July, September, and sit at those long committee hearings, and listen to every goddamn interest group or one man band give their submissions in to these committees, but that is how the vast bulk of legislation happens, through boring long-winded committees in the dog days of summer. Year in, year out.

I understand that. I’m not saying you haven’t been working, and I’m not denying the progress you’ve made. I’m speaking more about what has changed since this government was elected.

I’d like to think that there has been a substantial sea-change within the Oireachtas, but I don’t think that there has.

No, but there has in the country.

I think the Irish people are still working their way through the Ryan Report, and there will be an opportunity when the Dublin Diocese report comes out, I think the anger will become a little bit directed, and we will see the opportunity to move the church away from a lot more from where its tendrils are in, a lot more in Ireland. But in here, the winds of change move fairly slowly.

Right, and therefore little radical parties can do a lot to highlight that.

We can. We can. But in realpolitik terms if we turned around and said “No, this actually doesn’t go far enough” –

You don’t have to go off in a huff. You just have to name it.

The naming of it is crucial.

Saying you’re “delighted” doesn’t help. There’s a cosiness about it that is infuriating a hell of a lot of people I know. That’s why the Greens are losing support. Because there’s a lack of distinction.

OK. Public perception. I still think they’re gobshites I’m dealing with across the table. I still think they don’t understand the issues. I still think they have moved very little. But when you look at what Dermot Ahern was saying ten years ago...

God help us, indeed.

And he came out very strongly and said, “in no way does this represent a step towards gay marriage”.

“In no way represents a move towards equality.” Exactly!

Maybe I should have come out and said “yes, it does, and I disagree with the Minister”. So, maybe, there does need to be a bit more creative tension there. But I suppose the nature of the place in here is that you move from one crisis to another. For example I’m dealing with a Criminal Justice Bill that will lock you up for a week without access to a lawyer. That’s been the battle for today. The point you’re making is that we need to be more vocal about the difference.

It’s essential. Otherwise the Greens are perceived to be just the ecological wing of the Fianna Fail party.

Oh. Oh. Oh.
(silence)

Be careful. That’s what’s happening.

Politics is all about perception. Sometimes how much you try to change the perception, you’re not going to get the recognition that you want.

No. But something has to be found to challenge what I’ve just accused you of, which obviously stung -

Yes, it did sting, it did sting. Because it’s very fucking easy, for example, for Vincent Salafia to be out there saying “Gormley Must Go To Save Tara”. I’m sorry, what does he want? Dick Roche to be in there? Bernard Durkan from Fine Gael? “Fuck Off!” is my response. The Greens have done more to save Irish archaeology than any Minister in the last twenty-five years.

I completely agree. But you’re outraged?

I’m outraged that they’ve called on John Gormley to resign.

That’s not the point. You have to assume that there is goodwill out there, that there are people out there crying out for some intelligent, visionary sense of Ireland. You have to not let it get bogged down.

Look. John Gormley appointed the best archaeologist in Ireland, Conor Newman, to head up a working group on how you safeguard Irish archaeology. That’s huge! I hate the cheap shots. It’s a cheap shot to hold a banner outside Dáil Éireann saying “Gormley must go!” I’m not accusing any Equality-related organisation have done the same thing to the Greens, about Civil Unions, but I take your point. We need to show that creative difference.

Thank you for your time.

Dermod Moore will return to his usual slot in Wildlife next issue.