Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Fowler is making rather a meal of it. I can think of only one justification for having a referendum, and that is to allow the Prime Minister to get off the hook on which he has impaled himself by bringing forward this Bill in the first place. Everybody knows that the Bill came forward to Parliament in a most disreputable fashion. We have gone over this many times, so I will say it in a sentence or two. Three days before the election, the Prime Minister said that he had no plans to bring forward such a Bill; there was no reference to it in any party manifesto; there was nothing about it in the coalition agreement; and there was no proper consultation. The result is that UKIP is having a field day—