Regards, Ivan
Posted on 10/16/2002 2:56:12 PM PDT by MadIvan
The House of Lords has narrowly rejected government plans to allow gay and unmarried heterosexual couples to adopt children.
MPs have already agreed to end the present system where only married couples and single people can adopt.
But peers voted by 196 votes to 162 to maintain the ban on unmarried couples, including gay partners.
The Adoption and Children Bill will now return to the Commons, where MPs are expected to overturn the move.
Marriage
But the delay could affect the chances of the bill, which contains other child welfare measures, becoming law in the near future.
Ministers had wanted the measures on the statute book before the opening of Parliament on 13 November.
Supporters of the proposals say too many children are still waiting to be adopted.
But Conservative family values campaigner Lady O'Cathain, who has led the campaign to retain the ban, said the proposals will undermine marriage and put children at risk by placing them in unstable relationships.
Baroness O'Cathain said she was called by family values campaigner Baroness Young to take up the fight just 12 hours before she died last month.
Large turnout
Peers were given a free vote on the issue at the end of a highly-charged three hour debate.
Twenty Labour peers backed the Tory amendment blocking gay and unmarried adoption, with 48 crossbenchers and two bishops.
Among those on Labour's benches who supported the move were Muslim peers Lord Ahmed and Baroness Uddin.
The Bishop of Chelmsford, the Rt Rev John Perry and the Bishop of Winchester also voted to restrict adoption to married couples.
The large turnout included former Prime Minister Baroness Thatcher.
Stability
Tory health spokesman, Earl Howe, seeking to restrict adoption to married couples, told peers: "Perhaps the thing I object to most, if this bill were to go through now as it is, is that for the purposes of adoption the law would place marriage, co-habitation and gay partnerships on a platform of legal equivalence.
"The fact of a couple being married would carry no weight at all in any choice between alternative sets of adopters."
The Tory peer said marriage provided the best chance of stability for children who had already suffered turbulence in their lives.
Gay rights campaigners claim opponents of change are putting their objections to homosexuality before the interests of children.
Personal blow
Under current law, only married couples and single people, including gay people, are allowed to adopt.
Wednesday's vote will come as a particular blow to Lord Alli.
The Labour peer, who is gay, gave a personal commitment to becoming an adoptive parent with his long term partner if the law was changed.
He said the current debate had "set married couples against unmarried couples and married couples against gay couples" when what was needed was to find homes for children in institutional care.
Lord Alli said he would "happily agree" that married couples should have priority over both gay and unmarried couples.
But he added: "What I cannot agree with is that a child in institutional care is better off than in a loving, caring home."
Regards, Ivan
Love, Ivan
"How the Irish Saved Civilization" bump.
As for O'Reilly ... he doesn't get it. He thinks it would be swell for gays to posion the innocent minds of children. He's also against the death penalty. The only wat to rid society of these horrendous murders is to put them to death.
Today, not ten or twenty years ago, it's very difficult to kill an innocent person on death row. DNA works both ways. Frees the innoncent and condemns the guilty. I can't imagine why O'Reilly is soft on crime and punishment. Ou prisons here are a joke. In San Franciso, convicts are allowed accupuncture, massages, make pron movies, take illegal drugs etc.. It'a not just in San Franciso that this goes on either. Truly when a murdered is determined guilty, then have him pay with his/her life. It's no longer true that punishment is worse being in prison. Prison is a joke at tax payers expense.
This was the only part of the article that brought a smile to the homosexuals reading it. Ain't that a shame.
Typical of gays. I'm sure the debate did no such thing. Burden your opponent by sticking them with the task of defeating accusations for crimes that don't exist.
The gay political agenda is really all about making a mockery of marriage within a guise of "rights" and social injustice.
It implies that a single parent household provides a more secure environment for raising children than that of two unmarried individuals. Raising a child as a single adoptive parent is both challenging and rewarding. I know from personal experience.
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