Conservative rump of members seeking to stamp out Law Society support for the YES vote … SSM … Never mind the facts, just feel the stale assertions … Remembering Molly Bloom
Their aim is to maintain a robust regime of human inequality for all. No Same Sex Marriage for Robin and his boys.
Specifically, the target is the August 19 joint announcement by the council of the society in support of marriage equality, arm-in-arm with the bar association and the NSW AMA.
Two-hundred-and-fifty solicitor members are needed to bring on an EGM, which would then consider motions to have the gay-crazed Law Soc council brought to heel. The notice to requisition the meeting was posted on the Law Society’s Facebook page by someone called Phillip Thompson from Wyong. There is a law shop called Phillip Thompson & Associates at Penrith.
The requisition form is here.
The proposed motions include a censure of the council because the joint statement is “incorrectly holding out that all solicitors in NSW had united in supporting marriage equality laws”.
Further, the requisitionists want the appointment of a “safeguards committee” of three wise members to “inform and advise” the council as to what legislation and regulations should be put in place “to respect aspirations to equality and to protect guarantees of freedom of speech, conscience, thought, religion, association, assembly, expression and other essential freedoms and rights”.
Robin wrote a column for The Australian, published Sept. 15, in which he says that equality was all very well, but it had to give way to “justice”.
Speed’s statements are littered with misleading assertions.
The bar association has not experienced a similar revolt from a rump of conservative Roman Catholic and evangelical members. President Arthur Moses said:
“The recent joint statement regarding marriage equality reflects the bar council’s public stance on this issue over the last few years. That position is a matter of public record.”
To boot, Moses has asked Richard Weinstein SC to be the bar’s advocate for change.
The bar officially got on board with marriage equality in 2015, and the law society in 2012.
Speed also created the shadowy Rule of Law Institute, which lobbies against government regulators that could make life difficult for his corporate clients.
Incredibly, Spiggsy Spigelman is patron saint of this outfit and David Lowy, Nicholas Cowdery and Richard McHugh are on the governing committee.
By September 20, the council of the society must have been feeling a bit edgy. It issued a statement saying it stuck by its support for SSM and also “supports respectful debate”.
However, the real purpose of the announcement was to try and hose down Speed and to state the bleeding obvious. “Members of the Law Society are encouraged to vote in the postal survey as their conscience dictates.”
“It is also important the rights we all presently enjoy, including freedom of speech and freedom of religion, should remain unaffected by any proposed laws to enable same-sex couples to enter a civil marriage.”
The whole thing has more than a touch of madness about it. No organisation with the constitutional authority to make decisions is expected to poll each and every member on policy matters – unless you’re a Coalition government that is incapable of making decisions.
The Law Society says members’ response to the council’s resolution has been overwhelmingly positive.
If there is an EGM, and the merry men are still canvassing for numbers, the indications are that it will be a shambolic defeat for Speed, Thompson and their PR man and beat-up merchant at The Australian, Chris (The Tamil) Merritt.