Abbott said Australians should vote down marriage equality if they were “concerned about where our country is going” and there was a “real issue” about religious freedom and freedom of speech if same-sex marriage is legalised. Brandis has said that the bills promoted by him and fellow Liberal senator, Dean Smith, to legalise same-sex marriage contain “very extensive protections of religious freedom”, in addition to the constitutional right of freedom of religion. Responding to that comment on Monday, Abbott said “a lot of people ... have been saying there is a real issue with the protection for religious freedom and freedom of speech if this thing goes through”. He said that although “marriage is the immediate focus, there are lots and lots of implications”, suggesting that marriage equality has led to “attacks on what’s taught in schools” in Britain and Canada. “If you look around the world, issues of religious freedom has flowed when we’ve seen a change to the definition of marriage,” he said.

Source: The Guardian August 21, 2017 03:20 UTC