Tony Abbott to speak against marriage equality in USA

Former Prime Minister Tony Abbott is scheduled to deliver a speech to an anti-LGBTI group in the USA later this month.

The Australian Financial Review have reported that the high-profile No campaigner will be making his second guest appearance in two years for the Alliance Defending Freedom.

The ADF are a Christian group founded in 1994 with a mission to protect “religious freedom, the sanctity of life, and marriage and family”, according to their website.

Prominent civil rights advocacy group The Southern Poverty Law Centre describe the ADF as “a legal advocacy and training group that has supported the recriminalization of homosexuality in the U.S. and criminalization abroad” and have labelled the organisation a “designated hate group.”

A spokesperson for Abbott’s office said that the Liberal MP was honoured to have been invited by the ADF “to reiterate his well-known position that advocates for same-sex marriage must demonstrate how – in their brave new world – freedom of speech, freedom of religion and parental choice will be protected.”

The member for Warringah took to Twitter to respond to the AFR report on his trip, asserting that the debate on marriage was not over.

Re AFR story. This isn’t over. There are five million Australians yet to vote and the NO campaign is appealing to every one of them!

— Tony Abbott (@TonyAbbottMHR) October 19, 2017

Abbott’s trip follows the news that Labor have decided to support the current bill tabled by WA Senator Dean Smith, should the postal survey yield a ‘Yes’ outcome when the results are revealed on November 15th.

Senator Smith’s proposed legislation does not compel churches to offer marriage to same sex couples and only makes changes civil marriage, which former PM John Howard has described as “the barest of minimums.”

Conservative MPs including Western Australian Liberals Andrew Hastie and Ian Goodenough have teamed up with Senator Eric Abetz, Zed Seselja and the Australian Conservatives’ Cory Bernardi to create their own marriage bill, in the event that the ‘Yes’ campaign is successful.

Goodenough has described the bill he’s working on as one that has protections for religious organisations and people of faith that goes ‘beyond the wedding ceremony’.

OIP Staff