TORONTO, Dec. 20, 2004 Catholic Civil Rights League is pleased to report that support for retaining the traditional definition of marriage remains strong in the wake of the Dec. 9 Supreme Court of Canada opinion that the government would be within its Charter rights to extend the definition to include same sex couples.
A survey by Enshrine Marriage Canada (www.enshrinemarriage.ca) has found that 59.8 per cent of Canadians support keeping the definition of marriage as a union of one man and one woman.
This shows that the governments intention to open civil marriage to gay couples is very much at odds with what Canadians want, notes Phil Horgan, president of CCRL. We hope that our MPs will realize that a majority of Canadians do not want this change, and will remember how their MP voted at the next election.
The text of the EMC release follows. The French version is on our French language website.
Toronto, Dec. 17, 2004 William Gairdner, chairman of Enshrine Marriage Canada released the results of a public opinion poll taken after the Supreme Court of Canadas advice on same-sex marriage was made public and found an overwhelming majority of Canadians favour keeping the traditional definition of marriage as the union of man and one woman.
Almost 60 per cent of Canadians want the traditional definition of marriage preserved and protected, said Gairdner. Its clear that Canadians do not want to see the traditional definition of marriage altered or changed. Our political leaders need to listen to Canadians. The people of this country do not want profound changes to the definition of marriage.
Enshrine Marriage Canada seeks to protect the traditional definition of marriage through an amendment to the Constitution that will preserve marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Its clear from this survey that Canadians want traditional marriage to be protected, said Gairdner.
The debate over marriage is far from settled and all Canadians need to think deeply about the blind alley into which the Government of Canada wants to take marriage. From this survey, it looks like Canadians definitely think redefining marriage is wrong, said Gairdner.
Canadians were asked: Do you support/oppose keeping the definition of marriage as a union of one man and one woman? The survey commissioned by EMC and conducted by the Nordic Research Group found 59.8 per cent of Canadians support keeping the traditional definition of marriage. The survey interviewed 1023 Canadians by telephone from 11-16 December 2004 and has a margin of error of +/- 3.1 per cent.