A petition in defence of traditional marriage has been signed by more than 400,000 people.

The petition was launched by the Coalition for Marriage (C4M) in opposition to the Government’s plans to widen the definition of marriage to gay couples.

Since going live in February, the petition has gone on to become the largest campaign against a government policy in this Parliament.

The Government launched a consultation last month but stated that its aim was not to determine if the law on marriage should be changed, but to ascertain how to introduce the reform.

The Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, and the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, Archbishop Vincent Nichols, are among the Church leaders to oppose the plan.

In an interview with the Washington Post this week, the openly gay Labour MP Ben Bradshaw said that the gay community “never needed the word marriage”.

“This isn’t a priority for the gay community, which already won equal rights with civil partnerships,” he said.

C4M’s campaign director Colin Hart welcomed the level of support for the campaign.

“The campaign is going from strength to strength and there is no sign of a slowdown in the number people adding their names to the petition," he said.

“I welcome the comments by Mr Bradshaw, who has hit the nail on the head when he said that the Government is playing ‘pure politics’ with this issue.

“Civil partnerships already give the same legal rights to same sex couples that marriage gives to heterosexual couples. This squashes the Government’s major argument for forcing through this change.

“Many people are concerned about the proposed changes, their implications, the cost and why none of the three main political parties put this in their manifesto.”


On the web: http://c4m.org.uk/