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Mr. Andrew Mitchell: If I might have the temerity to differ with my right hon. Friend, it is the Government who are seeking to challenge convention and to change the law. The very small group of people whom we have been talking about will be forced by this legislation to get divorced, and I am seeking to ensure that that change does not take place.
Mr. Forth: As ever, my hon. Friend anticipates my next point, which concerns choice. Life is full of choices and we all have to make them from time to time. Some are very difficult and others less so, but to arrange the law simply so that people can avoid making very difficult choices is not a sound basis on which to work. However difficult it might be for the individuals whom we are talking about, to change the law in the way proposed by my hon. Friend, so that they will not have to make a very difficult and painful choice, is not a good basis on which to argue for a change in the law, particularly if it would lead—as I fear his new clause would—to what would amount to the sanctification of same-sex marriage. That would be the inevitable result.
This is exactly the issue that we must confront. However well intentioned, my hon. Friend's new clause would challenge marriage as we have understood it—and as the Government continue to understand it, I am glad to hear; I hope that Conservative Front Benchers take the same view—and it would say to people that we are now in the business of trying to eliminate difficult choices from life and of easing their path, whatever the result might be.
Richard Younger-Ross: On a doctrinal point, is it not true that many faiths and Churches would not in any case recognise a divorce under these circumstances, because we are talking about a sacrament that is taken, and which is there for life?
Mr. Forth: That is an argument against the Bill itself, which I shall be voting against on Third Reading, as it happens. The more that we consider the Bill and its ramifications, the more that it appears to be nonsense. I suspect that that was true in Committee and it has certainly been true this afternoon. One such nonsense the hon. Gentleman has just illustrated all too well. Whether or not one is a person of religion or faith—
Richard Younger-Ross:
I am sorry, but the right hon. Gentleman is being inconsistent. He says that he will
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vote against the new clause and against the Bill on Third Reading, but surely the consistent thing to do would be to vote for the new clause, which supports the doctrinal position.
Mr. Forth: No, it would not. Sadly, I anticipate that this dreadful Bill will get on to the statute book, in which case my position is completely consistent. Although I will vote against the Bill, I have the slight feeling that I could be in a minority. [Interruption.] Oh yes, I have a feeling for these things. I have been in this place long enough to know when I am probably going to be outvoted. Today might be one of those occasions, in which case I shall carry the principle through to my hon. Friend's new clause.
Mr. Andrew Mitchell: I am in a double embarrassment, for I fear that I might have to agree with the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Richard Younger-Ross). Is he not right in saying that it is perfectly possible to take the view of the Bill that my right hon. Friend takes while supporting my new clause? My right hon. Friend says that I am seeking to change the law, but it is the Government who are requiring the couples whom I described to make this dreadful choice between not receiving the certificate or getting divorced. That is the dilemma that they face.
My right hon. Friend also says—shuddering as he does so—that my new clause could be a back-door way of supporting same-sex marriage, but I am not supporting same-sex marriage. All these people were married as man and woman, and that fact should be considered pertinent. Nothing should change it thereafter.
Mr. Forth: Surely my hon. Friend recognises that, if a person is acknowledged to be of a new gender and if the marriage continues, the effect will be to have same-sex marriages. He cannot wriggle around by talking about the position before, during or after it happens: same-sex marriage will inevitably result.
Mr. Forth: I give way to my excitable hon. Friend.
5.15 pm
Mr. Bercow: The hon. Member for Teignbridge (Richard Younger-Ross) should understand one thing about my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth)—that his consistent view is that the world has been going progressively downhill since at least the 11th century and probably some hundreds of years before that. May I ask my right hon. Friend, in the best possible spirit, what a concession to a small group of people, whom many would judge deserving of it, can possibly do to undermine the great, valued and prized institution of marriage that he supports so much? Why does benefit to one group damage a great institution? Surely it is capable of sustaining itself, even in the event of the passage of new clause 4.
Mr. Forth:
I am grateful to my hon. Friend, but why he picked on the 11th century, I do not know. If pressed,
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I might well go much further back, but we will leave that debate for another day, Madam Deputy Speaker, because I know you disapprove of such digressions. We are here talking about slippery slopes and thin ends of wedges, with which my hon. Friend is as familiar as the rest of us. The sad truth is that every time we try to accommodate this or that group within society, we are in danger of undermining or challenging some of our long-standing and cherished traditions. For me, the new clause proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield is, sad to say, an example of that, so I shall be unable to support it. On this occasion—I will not say these words very often, but they are appropriate now—I will be happy to support the Government.
Richard Younger-Ross: We have heard how far back the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) might like to go back. My first parliamentary foray was in the old parliamentary constituency of Chislehurst, so I well know that there are caves located there.
The Government have challenged much religious thinking in introducing the Bill, but they may have become somewhat doctrinal in their position on new clause 7. When we could smell the smoke earlier, I wondered whether the fires of hell were opening up to consume those who were in favour of the Bill. On reflection, that is not the case, because much of the Bill is very Christian and religious. It recognises the genuine problems and the dilemma faced by transgender people.
The new clause helps people who are in an invidious position. People who have been married in church, taken vows and made a sacrament or people of other faiths who have taken vows and committed themselves for life—"till death do us part"—will be faced with the dilemma of whether to change gender or not. If I changed my gender, I would have to get divorced and break the vow that I had made in church. As we discussed earlier, there are some inter-sex people and some whose gender may have been incorrectly prescribed at birth. Those people may not necessarily be committing a blasphemy, as some have claimed, because the marriage may not be between people of the same gender. The marriage may be between people of opposite genders, but it becomes a problem of legal necessity purely because of the gender on a birth certificate.
Mr. Lammy: For the record, I must correct the hon. Gentleman. The inter-sex condition is clinically different from gender dysphoria and it is important that he is aware of that. Also, the Bill requires transsexual people to end their marriages in law, but the marriages could continue for religious purposes, as it were. Some religions do not recognise divorce for civil purposes.
Richard Younger-Ross:
I made the same point in an intervention on the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst. However, if religions can accept that marriages can carry on in those circumstances, why cannot the law do the same? Why are we creating an anomaly and putting a very small number of people in a totally invidious position? People who have felt trapped in the wrong body from an early age are under immense pressure. The Bill means that their inner man or woman
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can now be recognised, but at the very high cost of divorce. That leaves them between a rock and a hard place.
Mr. Lammy: The hon. Gentleman makes a good point and it is true that such people are in a difficult position. However, let us take the example of a woman with gender dysphoria who meets the Bill's criteria, satisfies the panel and subsequently becomes a man. To all intents and purposes, that person then is a man and must accept what goes with that status. Therefore, if that person is in a pre-existing relationship, the civil partnership route may represent the best option. A marriage may be so important that a person may decide not to apply for the full gender recognition certificate. I accept that such judgments are difficult to make, but the Government are not forcing people down any route.
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