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Government considers watered down same-sex marriage bill to minimise Tory rebellion
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Lib Dem MP Sarah Teather tells Catholic newspaper 'I never went into politics to tackle equal marriage'
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Christians called to pray at Parliament in opposition to equal marriage bill
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Does Brown even bother attending Parliament these days?
Not very often. His attendance rate since the last election is 14.1%. If I only turned up to work 14.1% of the time, I would be sacked.
He does a huge amount of constituency work, as well as aid and charity work.
Gordon Brown is still massively popular within his own constituency as he is an excellent constituency MP, and the people of Kircaldy and Cowdenbeath obviously want him in that seat or he wouldn’t be there.
hardly a surprise, he was always a bigot.
He was always a bigot.
A truly disgusting excuse for a human being.
I’m thoroughly ashamed to say that my MP is one of the ones who didn’t bother to vote despite having assured me that he intended to vote in favour. I have written and asked him to explain as I feel well and truly let down. In some ways it’s taken the shine of this evening for me. Sigh!
Who was it?
Shaun Woodward
Supposedly he couldn’t attend the vote because of “commitments made some months ago” – it does happen. He publicly supported the bill and has been consistently pro-LGBT in the past (doesn’t he have a trans sister?), so I doubt it was to avoid offending constituents. Jenny Willott is another supporter who didn’t turn up – but then she was due to give birth a few days ago.
Mine did ( Mark Lazarowicz).
I’m surprised and disappointed by that.
Surprised? Why?
His record on gay rights votes is utterly appalling.
He’s a Scot…nuff said!
so am i.
if i was to say ‘well you’re irish’ would you like that?
WTF?
There are plenty of decent Scots MPs.
For example, Lindsay Roy originally said NO to equal marriage. His constituents pointed out to him that churches that didn’t want to marry gays wouldn’t be forced to. He changed his mind and thus voted in favour.
Stop being a racist.
So am I. What’s your point?
I respect him for abstaining given his deeply held religious beliefs. He supported Civil Partnerships. That said, the majority of MPs and the general public (gay and straight) have moved towards supporting equal marriage in the last 2-3 years.
True Liam but that was at the end of the last parliament and had many flaws.
His ‘deeply held religious beliefs’ have nothing to do with my equal civil rights though.
Marriage has nothing to do with religion unless you want it to.
There is absolutely zero justification for using religion to deny equal civil rights.
so why do his deeply held religious beliefs give him and otehrs like him the right to impose people of OTHER religious beliefs. And has he actually tried reading the Bible to substantiate those beliefs…No? You do surprise me, the homophobes never have!
Alan Whitehead and John Denham,Labour mps for Southampton both voted for it ,according to the local newspape website!
Probably the first time in my life I’ve agreed with Gordon Brown – but I think it’s right that Scottish and NI MPs abstained. It’s not right for them to interfere with the law in England and Wales. My local Labour MP voted against the Bill. It’s ridiculous – no one voted for him to do that.
Too much to hope that the DUP would abstain. They’ll take every opportunity to cast their fire and brimstone around. It’s moments like today that they live for.
Their input into the debate would be amusing, if it weren’t so serious.
I half agree, half disagree.
On one hand, since Scots MPs have the ability to influence equality, they should.
On the other, Scotland should (and will) be an independent nation, and should concern ourselves with our own policy.
Thank heavens Labour have got a new leader. Brown was never chosen by the people anyway (gay or straight), that shows how popular his views were.
It will be interesting to work out how many Catholic MPs voted against/abstained/didn’t turn up. From my calculation 80% of the libdem Catholic MPs didn’t vote for equal marriage.
Next time around in 2015 I want MPs to make clear what religion they are from and whether they vote for the church or their constituents. Don’t know much about the labour MPs but I’m pretty disgusted with the lib dems who voted against or didn’t vote.
I’m pretty relieved that so much support came from Labour, they can generally be more or less proud of themselves in how they voted. It won’t be forgotten.
The number of Labour MPs who voted against and abstained is far too high. It makes me question my intention to vote Labour at the next election – if other people feel the same it could turn in to a very serious issue for Ed Miliband. He needs to get his house in order and made sure that on 3rd reading tmany more of hese people vote in favor. I’m quite happy to put my vote with the Greens if his party can’t deliver people who aren’t judgmental and who have an issue with my sexuality.
Also, how do these votes compare with what they said before the vote – why have some voted against when C4EM has them saying they would vote for?
they lost my vote during their last time in office passing homophobic and transphobic bills
Come on, I don’t think it was that bad.
About 85% of Labour MPs voted in favour of the bill, which is higher than the LibDems and certainly an awful lot higher than the Tories.
He is confused.
OMG, 20 Labour MPs voted against it.. that means everyone vote Tory in the next election! Seriously people?!
Definite astroturfing going on here.. Tory HQ is invading the internet at the moment trying to exploit this for Love-me-Dave.
Well numbers are numbers.
A majority of Tory MPs continue to believe we are 2nd class citizens.
They can’t spin those shocking numbers no matter how hard they try.
Could some MPs have ‘good’ excuses for not voting?
Jenny Willott, Cardiff Central, Liberal Democrat, was giving birth at the time. We love her anyway and forgive her for that!
Disappointed that he did not vote in favor of marriage equality.
George pull the other one
He does a hell of a lot of international charity work along with his wife, so I’m unwilling to denounce him for not being there if that may have been the reason. It’s been well known for some time now that the numbers were more than there for a majority. However like most ex Prime Ministers he has a dire voting record after losing his position, and on that general reality he should seriously reconsider whether the fundamental responsibility of representing the people of Kirkcaldy is what he has a continued passion for. I’ve heard he can be great in the constituency, but if you don’t turn up to Westminster then you’re really not earning your wage.
If he is great in his constituency, he isn’t getting noticed by the local media. Other Labour MPs are, though.
I rarely here him on the local station (Kingdom FM) or read about him in the local press.
If he’s doing anything locally, it’s going unnoticed.
I understand why he might be unmotivated now he’s not PM, in which case, he needs to give up and let someone else take his seat.
I worked for a year for a politician of a differing party in the same region, and believe me, he’d get the big and small gigs whenever he pleased. Annoyingly. And people lavished praise on his ability to publicise local issues.
Still a lot of goodwill toward him I sensed.
Man, what a hypocrite. One thing that really pisses me off is when members of parliament don’t even vote on an important subject. Even if it was a ‘no’, at least I’d know where he stands. To have the privilege in voting in legislature and not even vote, to me, is cowardly and selfish, but that’s just my opinion.
He is a Scottish MP this was a vote that concerns England and Wales. He was right not to vote.
If he decides not to vote on equal marriage on Scotland that will be a different story
He can’t vote for (or against) equal marriage in Scotland as he’s not an MSP.
I take your point about him being a Scottish MP, but I bet he’ll happily vote on other Bills that don’t affect Scotland – education, health etc. Gordon Brown has a history of avoiding votes on gay equality, this is no different. He’s clearly too scared to vote either way. It’s really disgusting.
Sorry I stand corrected I didn’t realise he wasn’t an MSP.
If he says he supports marriage equality on his website I don’t see why he would have been “scared” to vote. I would like to know how he can get away with only attending 14% of votes.
When I say he’s scared to vote, I mean scared of facing his voters. If he votes for or against, he’s bound to upset one side or the othet. This way he can claim not to have voted for it or against it.
As you point out yourself, he claims to support equal marriage yet doesn’t turn up for the vote – and this is not a first for him, it’s his usual pattern for votes on gay equality. So there is clearly more to it than he was busy elsewhere.
I think it’s unfair to call him a bigot. He was supporting gay equality way back in the 80s, if I remember well. I think his problem is that he is too concerned with certain issues and probably should think more about others. Having said that, I can’t say that I’m terribly enthusiastic about him
His voting record on gay rights is dreadful.
It’s hardly a coincidence that he has abstained on pretty much every piece of gay rights legislation.
He may not be a bigot but he is no friend to the gay community.
Yes, he should have voted, and it is negative that he didn’t. But to abstain from voting for something is not the same as voting against something. I would reserve the term ‘dreadful’ for those who actively vote against us.
except that when he became Prime Minister, he made a speech about fairness being in Labour’s DNA. So for him even to abstain is dreadful.
Not voting against is not good enough for someone who’s made a particular claim to enlightenment and any such MP who has done so and then did not vote in favour last night is dishonourable and not fit to serve.
Not surprising given his past record on not turning up to vote for gay rights. He can’t claim to support it but abstain – it just doesn’t make sense.
I feel that abstaining or not turning up to the vote is very cowardly. It more or less means the MP involved doesn’t want to vote for it but is too scared to vote against it. Making laws is arguably their most important duty yet they avoid doing it.
Note, equal marriage is a devolved issue. The majority of sensible Scottish MPs of all parties (except the Tories but they only had one MP) sensibly decided to abstain on a vote that would only affect English and welsh people. The Scottish parliament will be introducing its own legislation and that is the proper place to debate and vote.
Agreed, however a great number of the Labour MPs that voted against seemed to be Scottish MPs which is disgusting.
I can understand a Scottish MP voting for marriage equality, even if it is for England & Wales only, because it shows they believe in equality for gay people and want to do what they can to help. But for a Scottish MP to vote against it shows them up to be nothing but nasty homophobes. Why not just abstain if they couldn’t bring themselves to support it? Sadly, I doubt it will harm their chances at the next election and most of these bigots will retain their seats. I am so glad the boundary changes didn’t happen now because it would likely have meant my being represented by one of these homophobes!
If that was the real reason why some Scottish MPs abstained, then I can accept that – so long as they do likewise on all other legislation which doesn’t affect Scotland. I feel many of them used it as an excuse, though. As for the ones who voted against, absolutely sickening! They are just homophobes, no question about it. I’m glad to see my own local MP voted for equal marriage.
Quite a lot of them do this. The SNP members do so out of principe and so actually to both Gordon Brown and Charles Kennedy. All of these maintained this principe on this vote. It should be noted that there is no constitutional requirement for any of them t do this so it should be seen as something commendable.
I knew the SNP took this stance, but I was unaware other Scottish MPs did too. If Brown & Kennedy didn’t vote purely because it wasn’t Scottish legislation, then fair enough. But do you know for certain that they do this everytime there’s a vote on legislation which doesn’t affect Scotland?
All members of Parliament are equal and can vote. No excuse. Its ironic that exactly by issue of equal marriage some Deputies has acting as less equal than others.
Actually, not sure that is true. Following devolution the number of Scottish MPs was substantially decreased and though it is not expected that they refuse to participate in votes on devolved issues, many of them do.
Save your ire for the Scottish MPs who showed no principle in participating in the vote and the. Used it to vote against. These were mostly Catholic MPs who seem to be voting on bloc both north and south of the border. Some have even admitted that they take their whip from the Vatican now. Time to start campaigning for their UK party whips to be withdrawn as punishment.
Technically, quite a few bits of the bill do apply to Scotland and Northern Ireland, such as the changes to the Equality Act, and the stuff about marriages in consulates and the military.
Note David Blunkett did vote in favour after all.
Good old Gordon. Probably the most overrated politician of his generation who never fails to disappoint. Makes me ashamed of my 32 years of Labour Party membership.
Matters not a jot. The guy is a spent force and since his tirade against the newspapers probably has mental ilness problems. He will probably take a peerage at the next election to sit with the other ermine clad waste of spaces. More to be pitted than reviled
So Barry you got prejudices against people with mental illnesses/disabilities? His is more like personality disorder, there’s a difference!
The legislation only applies to England & Wales. Gordon Brown represents a Scottish constituency. He was right not to vote on an issue that does not extend to Scotland.
Fair comment, doesnt explain how come he never voted for LGBT when he could have done and when it would have made a huge difference. Good riddance.
I looked up the voting record once and I dont think he EVER bother to vote FOR LGBT progress. Wasnt impressed even inside 10 Downing Street at the LGBT reception. Actions speak louder than words matey
“I support it, but I’m such a pathetic, whining loser that I can’t stand up and make my opinion count!”
Sounds about right…