Celebrating five years of civil unions
Ngaio Town Hall, Wellingon
Saturday 5 Decemeber 2009 

Welcome to the Ngaio Town Hall, in the heart of the Ohariu Electorate.  My name is Charles Chauvel.  I am a Labour List MP and a proud member of Labour’s Rainbow caucus.  I have also been Labour’s candidate in this electorate for the past two elections.  One of the major reasons I decided to stand for Parliament here is because its local MP, Peter Dunne, was the only MP representing a Wellington constituency to vote against the Civil Union Act in 2004.  Back then, Peter Dunne said of civil unions that they were:

“a piece of pc nonsense”
“setting up what is effectively same sex marriage but under a different name - and that's why I'm opposed to it”
“going to diminish the status of marriage in many people's eyes, because you can trade your marriage down to be a civil union”.

At the 2005 election, just after the civil union debate, Peter’s majority was 7072.  Last year, it was 1006.  In 2011, he won’t have a majority, because the people of this electorate believe in fairness.  They don’t want to be represented by someone so out of touch with the mainstream of New Zealand public opinion.  That opinion clearly favours the right of people to formalise their relationship status.  And so it should, since there have now been over 2000 celebrations conducted under the Act.

Thank you for joining me today at this celebration.  We have some very special guests here today.  To my rainbow colleagues Chris Carter – the first openly gay MP to be elected to Parliament - and to Grant Robertson – the first gay MP for Wellington Central, welcome.  To Moana Mackey, who voted for the final stages of the Bill, just as her mother voted for its earlier ones, great to have you here.  To Des Smith and John Jolliffe, longtime Ngaio residents and the first couple in Wellington to have had a civil union, it is great to have you here.  It is also fantastic to have many other people here who have had civil union ceremonies over the past five years.

We have also been supported by many people who cannot be here.  We have a signed copy of Chris Brickell’s book, “Mates and Lovers”.  Tim Barnett, my former colleague who worked so hard to realise this measure, has sent a message via You-Tube that we will play shortly.  Thanks to our former Prime Minister, Helen Clark, for providing a message to be read out, as well as to Lianne Dalziel, the Minister of Justice who introduced the Civil Union Bill, for doing the same thing.

Lianne’s message reminds us that we have something more to celebrate than the 5th anniversary of the Civil Union Act becoming law next Wednesday.  Last Wednesday evening, Parliament finally did away with the partial defence of provocation.  That defence was used far too often to sanction the murder of gay men, and of women in difficult relationships, and it is good to also be celebrating its removal today.

We are continuing today to mark our collective journey through legal equality to dignity.  There are more milestones to come.  A group of us in Parliament is working on one of the last – the need to make care of children legislation blind to sexual orientation or gender – and we will be in a position to tell you more about that early next year.  Meanwhile, thank you for joining us in today’s celebrations.