On Monday the Conservatives published their "Contract for Equalities" announcing that they will if elected consider the case for civil partnerships between same-sex couples to be "called and classified as marriage".
About 18 months ago my firm in partnership with Queen Mary University of London and two other City law firms launched a Legal Advice Centre offering free legal advice on issues affecting the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) community. The advice centre is called Pink Law. The clear message we have received from the LGBT community is that the re-classification of "civil partnership" as "marriage" is a deeply important one and by no means a matter of mere semantics.
In fact the central issue is one of equality.
"Marriage" conveys a sense of celebration sadly lacking from the legal construct of "civil partnership". This may in part be because those who lobbied hard for the enactment...
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