Vic Gov accused of misrepresenting Tas registry

This media release was issued by the TGLRG on 1.6.07.

Tasmanian gay activists have accused the Victorian Government of misrepresenting Tasmania's relationship registry to justify a watered-down version in the Garden State.

The Victorian Department of Justice has issued a discussion paper on relationship registries, ahead of a community meeting on the issue on Monday night, which portrays Tasmania's relationships registry in a way Tasmanian Gay and Lesbian Rights Group spokesperson, Rodney Croome, said bares little resemblance to reality.

"In terms of the legal benefits of registration, the paper focusses entirely on property division, conspicuously failing to note that a Tasmanian Deed of Relationship gives registered couples virtually the same rights as married couples, including parenting rights, and that registered Tasmanian relationships are recognised overseas as civil unions", Mr Croome said.

"Just as worrying is the suggestion that Tasmania's registry recognises existing relationships, when, in legal terms, it actually creates new ones just like a civil union scheme or marriage."

"To maintain the fiction that the Tasmanian registry is less than it is, the Victorian Justice Department wrongly asserts, firstly, that Tasmanian registering couples need to present a statutory declaration as evidence they are in an existing relationship, when in fact no such declaration is required by the Tasmanian Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages, and secondly, that registered couples must prove a two year cohabitation period before a court will consider an application for property division, when no such requirement exists."

Mr Croome said the aim of the Justice Department's distortions is to make the Tasmanian registry look even less like marriage than it already is.

"What we are seeing in this discussion paper is the emergence of a new type of relationship recognition that is only for people who are already in de facto or domestic relationships", Mr Croome said.

"It's up to Victorians to decide if this is what they want, but they shouldn't be mislead into thinking that is what prevails in Tasmania."

For a copy of the Victorian Department of Justice discussion paper on relationship registries visit http://tglrg.org/more/275_0_1_0_M/
For a copy of the requirements to register a Tasmanian Deed of Relationship visit http://www.justice.tas.gov.au/bdm/relationships/how_to_register_a_deed_of_relationship

For more information contact Rodney Croome on 0409 010 668.