The Queensland Govt has hit the GLBTI community particularly hard this week. Access to courts when a relationship breaks down = gone. Altruistic surrogacy for the GLBTI community = gone. Me as a potential tourist in QLD = gone. Unfortunately we'd only just spent 7 days in the Whitsundays. You know what my lasting memory will be? Feeling like a second class citizen on my return. It won't be happeni
ng again. I know NSW, ACT, Vic, Tas and SA have social inclusion policies that make me feel welcome. That's where I'll be headed! Queensland has always been all about nature: beaches, surf and the inherent happiness of being amongst it. But now, with Campbell Newman and the Liberal National Party (LNP), that’s all changed. With a voters mandate to fix the economy amidst spiralling debt the LNP has used their first 100 days in office to damage, as a priority of government, to denigrate and put at risk both the GLBTI community and relationship Queensland has with the wider community within Queensland, in Australia and globally. Within the first 100 days of government a priority has been to entirely de-fund Queensland’s peak GLBTI Health Services organisation. Not content with that the government, citing the sensitivities of a small yet powerful Christian lobby group, the Australian Christian Lobby (ACL), revoked State sanctioned ceremonies as part of the Civil Union scheme in Queensland. This is where it gets interesting. Wendy Francis, QLD Director of ACL, then foreshadowed that this was only the first step in impacting the lives of QLDs GLBTI community. She said that the Civil Union scheme would be renamed as a Partnerships Register and that it would be simplified. Low and behold, pushed through parliament late one night the following week, the LNP changed the Civil Unions scheme to become a Partnerships Register. Citing simplicity the state’s Attorney General removed access to the court system if and when any of these relationships failed. It would now be “simply” a matter of going to the Office of Births, Deaths and Marriages to “de-register”.
…like clapped out car. While you wouldn’t think it was possible in this day and age, the Katter’s Australia Party (KAP) is moving to actually exclude the GLBTI community entirely from these watered down provisions. Their policy is to make the Partnerships Register exclusively for the use of heterosexual Queenslanders. And it doesn't stop there. The LNP are moving against current rights to access IVF regardless of orientation. Queensland has moved quickly from being a (brief) leading state to being regressive. So, in the face of increasing hostility towards the Queensland GLBTI community, in the face of a surge of depression and suicidal thoughts communicated online by the state’s GLBTI community we’d like to know:
Where are you going to spend your tourist dollars in the foreseeable future? We’re looking for alternatives to the “nature, beaches and surf” that is all that Queensland has to offer and what better place but the largest island on the planet? Australia has an abundance of travel options for the intrepid adventurer, the laid back relaxer or those that like a little bit of both. We also have regions and businesses that have a positive trajectory towards embracing diversity. Businesses that are GLBTI friendly, Tourism Associations that would like to promote their State or region as embracing diversity, people that have had beautiful experiences that they’d like to share from outside of Queensland, we want to hear from you! While the official Queensland Tourism page actively deletes posts that give potential visitors a more comprehensive impression of the state here we’ll have free reign. If you’re involved in the Tourism industry in Queensland and the idea of losing business upsets you this is not the place to express your frustration. We recommend that you write to your local member who was, most likely, responsible for this blight to befall your otherwise lovely state.
…because, while Queensland is lovely, homophobia and discrimination is certainly not lovely and Australia has some great alternatives. I'd like to share some of my choices and would love to see and hear about yours. (This is not a page where people can debate the validity or social acceptability or innate goodness of the GLBTI community. As Tourism QLD is deleting our entirely reasonable posts on their page we will act similarly.)
