It is clear that the coalition’s bill before the last election restating that marriage was between a man and a woman, while having no practical effect on who could get married, was a signal to social conservatives that the coalition held similarly social conservative values. I bet that the federal government’s dragging feet response to Warren Entsch’s “bill” to remove distinctions in commonwealth legislation between heterosexual and homosexual relationships (apart from marriage) is about appealing (or not being unappealing) to socially conservative voters.

I think it’s pretty fair to say that being in a recognised heterosexual relationship only confers penalties for Social Security Act purposes. The only benefit that springs to mind is bereavement payments, but given that one of you has to die to get it, I’m not much moved.

the recognition carries benefits (?), like property rights, family tax benefits etc. The loss to the governement is obviously the amount of benefits that it doesn’t pay now that it would have to, and differences in tax takes based on combined family incomes versus two separate ones.
Actually, as far as I’m concerned, the government should have no role in determining how people classify their relationships — it should just treat people as individuals, although this isn’t even slightly possible at all under the current system. This way we could delete the government from the mess which it has created, and wouldn’t need to worry about being registered by default, registering, who is allowed to marry people, etc.

I think the problem with heterosexual relationships is that you can lose benefits in some circumstances compared to being single (like unemployment) — so if you were in one of these situations, it would be stupid to register. I presume this is why the government has obscure rules about classifying people as in a relationship. I think the solution is to change partners every year and half or so.

Having said that I agree with Russell’s point. That is a great line, “The state has married me off”.

If marriage were the sacrocant institution that the anti-same sex couple lobby maintained, they would argue against de facto provisions of the law, they’d bring back ‘at fault’ divorce, recriminilise adultry, etc.

“some de factos don’t even know that they are technically in a de facto relationship and may not realise the legislation applies to them.)” I remember telling a friend of mine who is in a de facto relationship that to all intents and purposes the law regarded her as married to ‘the boyfriend’ - she went and checked the law and was horrified, she emailed me back “The state has married me off and not even told me…”