Pink politics with Grace Grace

By Miles Heffernan

And the winner of the 2009 Queen's Birthday Ball LGBT Friendly Politician of the Year goes to: Grace Grace.  A well deserved winner, who in the past year has become more involved in Brisbane's LGBT community than any other politician in recent memory. Not a bad achievement, but even more impressive when you consider she has only been in the job for a year and a half.

Since winning the seat of Brisbane Central upon the resignation of former Premier Peter Beatie, Grace has well and truly hit the ground running - she became the first politician to formally invite the LGBT community to Parliament House, has become a vocal supporter & member of Open Doors, stood toe to toe with her opponents at the Sportsman Hotel and gave an inspirational speech at this year's Pride Rally and March.

QNews recently met with Grace to discuss her relationship with the community and to find out how we can be better served by the politicians that we elect.

Grace, let me start by congratulating you on winning The Queen's Birthday Ball Award of LGBT Friendly Politician of the year. How did it feel to win the award?

I was surprised and pretty humbled - one never feels that they are worthy for these kind of awards so I felt really touched and humbled. It was really great to receive.

What you think was the biggest contributing factor to you winning the award?

Hmmm...  Perhaps because I sang karaoke at the Sporties during the last campaign? (Laughs) But I have worked with the LGBT community for some time, and since being elected I certainly haven't shirked any of those responsibilities and perhaps people have recognised that.

Speaking of that debate at the Sporties, it was pointed out that night that minority groups really shouldn't wait until an election cycle is almost up before trying to gain access to their pollies. Do you think that nights like that and a greater engagement from the community will assist in pushing for recognition and rights?

Yes, I think it does pave the way for that. The good thing that I have tried to work with, and a lot of my colleagues too, is trying to mainstream the LGBT community's issues in policy making. It is really pleasing to see that a lot of the departments are starting to see the LGBT community as having a place when it comes to planning & policy formation. I think that is a really good thing.

And the only way we can keep this going is to keep that dialogue with your local members and Ministers that this is a significant community that needs to have a voice.

Would you put your support behind the establishment of an LGBT reference group for new policies like is seen with other communities?

Sometimes we talk about doing stuff like that and often that's not the way to go forward. A reference group, depending on what its tasks are, who's on it and if it has the right ears often won't work. The better thing is to mainstream it in the policy formations in the various areas. Just having one group is not necessarily the way to go, but if it is something that we could do that could help then I reckon it's not a bad idea.

Recently the Parliament of Queensland has decided to include the LGBT community in its Community Engagement Program, aiming to enable the members of our community to gain access to and play a greater role in the parliamentary process. What do you find are the best ways for minority groups to be able to gain access to their local member and to have the broad support of the Members of Parliament?

Often I find minority groups can really do well when they come forward with practical solutions. If there is an issue and they can put together a practical solution that is really well supported, that isn't terribly controversial so to speak, but that recognises the importance of the issue and comes together with a solution, it goes a long way to helping.

An example is back when we were doing the industrial relations laws years ago, we engaged with the LGBT  community about same sex couple under the act having the same rights as heterosexual couples. The LGBT community had the solution and it was a really easy way of doing it. We got that done, and that was back in '99.

Can you think of a way that the community can bring forward some of the more controversial issues such as same sex marriage and dare I say the 'S' word - sodomy laws, which are often watered down to 'equal age of consent' without having every politician running for the hills?

If I had the magic pudding, I would love to mix it and let you have a slice, but unfortunately that is pretty hard to do sometimes. I guess the thing is to raise the issues and try to mainstream them as much as you can and bring forward a solution that isn't too radical to implement.

Often people come in very angry, yelling “Why aren't you doing this? Why is this so?” instead of coming in saying “isn't this pretty crazy? Wouldn't this be a better way?”

Though not directly linked to your portfolio, the ongoing funding of Open Doors and other LGBT organisations has been a hot topic of late. Are there any updates you can give us about what's happening there?

I spoke with Karen (Struthers - Minister for Community Services) briefly last week. My understanding is that the ongoing core funding will continue, I think that it was some of the one-off project funding that because of the tightening of the budget may be under some doubt.  Some of the groups seeking one-off funding may struggle to get some, though we are looking at different areas where we might be able to do something for some of those organisations.

You may recall throwing a lot of support behind funding The Open Doors Youth Suicide Project during the election campaign at the Sportsman Hotel. Is it on your radar to continue to lobby internally to re-fund this project?

Yes, very much so. I have already.

You realise QNews will continue to nag you for the next three years?

(Laughs) I have started to lobby already and will continue to do so.

The last time we spoke one of the key issues were the proposed changes to the adoption laws. The laws exclude gay and lesbian couples but were never able to pass because Parliament was dissolved when the election was held. Where does the Adoption Bill stand now?

The Bill was resubmitted and went through without any changes. It will likely be debated in the first week in August.

You had previously told QNews that the changes to the Adoption Bill were primarily about fixing the mistakes that were made in the previous Bill. Do you think that by excluding gay and lesbian couples in the new laws, that the Government are simply just making more mistakes that will need to be corrected by future governments?

That's a good question. I don't know the answer to that because I don't at this stage really know the real need for same sex couples to adopt out there or if it about recognising same sex couples as far as parental rights - that is more the issue that I am getting. 

I have had a number of people come to me concerned because they were in a same sex relationship where children were involved and had no legal right because they were not the maternal mother or paternal father. I walked with a couple in this position just the other week in the Pride March.

I noticed you on Pride Day in the Rainbow Labour tent, what is your relationship with them like?

My relationship with them is really good, I work with them and spent half the (Pride) day helping out on the tent and blowing up balloons. I think I was the only pollie there on the day. They are a fantastic group and it is another great way to become involved. I would really urge people who have an interest to link with Rainbow Labor - they do a really good work in the ALP to try and push the issues for the LGBT community.

Grace, thank you for your time today and we look forward to catching up with you soon.

Thank you, it was my pleasure.