Lyle Shelton, the Managing Director of the Australian Christian Lobby says gay couples don’t to get married and the entire marriage equality debate is about ulterior motives.

Shelton, one of the leading voices of the NO campaign, was a appearing on Sky News when he made the claim.

“I don’t think this debate has even been about marriage.” Shelton said, before claiming most gay couples are not interested in getting married.

“There’s about 47,000 same-sex couples in Australia based on the last census. Based on overseas experience where marriage has been redefined in law, whether its Sweden, New Zealand or elsewhere, maybe five to ten percent of same-sex couples might want to get married.”

“It’s a tiny percentage, of a tiny percentage of couples” the ACL leader claimed.

Shelton said what the marriage equality is really about is changing the established order of society, listing free speech, gender and education as his areas of concern.

“It’s about forever changing our understanding of gender, and what it means to be male and female.” Shelton said.

“It has nothing to do with marriage.”

Alex Greenwich from Australian Marriage Equality was also appearing on the program and highlighted that Lyle Shelton and the ACL hardly ever talk about marriage in their campaign.

“For Lyle, this debate has never been about marriage; he rarely even talks about it,” Greenwich said on Sunday.

“For us, this has always been about marriage.”

“Marriage is a fundamental celebration of love and commitment and it is something that should be afforded to every Australian.”

OIP Staff