Parliament is entering the frenzied final hours leading up to the second reading of the same-sex marriage bill. MPs will vote on the legislation at around 7pm tomorrow, and today’s papers are full of reports that while there is no whipping operation on the free vote, the Conservative leadership is doing its best to encourage MPs who are wavering to support it.
Beyond those who are implacably opposed to the idea of gay marriage are others who worry that though the government has done its best with the ‘quadruple lock’ to protect religious institutions that wish to opt out of same-sex ceremonies, the matter isn’t really in ministers’ hands. Michael Gove’s own constituency chair Geoffrey Vero made this point on Pienaar’s Politics last night:
‘Although Michael says in the Mail today that he has total confidence in the legislation, well that’s not what he told me only a week ago when I met him in Parliament.
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