2022: Expressed the view that Parliament has the duty to clarify the definitions of marriage and family for Singapore

Looking at the recent developments in other jurisdictions like India, India's Supreme Court struck down part of the section 377 of their Indian Penal Code, which also criminalised gay sex. It went further to redefine marriage and familial relationships. As recent as in August this year, India's Supreme Court widened the definition of the family institution and ruled that familial relationships, "can also take the form of domestic, unmarried partnerships and queer relationships."  

To me, what happened in India gives a glimpse of the implications on societal norms when the judiciary branch of the government, which is the courts, instead of the legislative branch of the government, which is the parliament, began to interpret what are social norms, because the legislative branch, that is, the Parliament, avoided dealing with the matter.

As such, I think it is right for this Parliament of Singapore to debate and decide on the risks posed by recent constitutional challenges that our Court is also facing in terms of section 377A in our Penal Code, with the most recent one in just February this year in the case of Tan Seng Kee vs Attorney-General.

As I am not a trained lawyer, I will not dwell further into the legality of this case, which Minister Shanmugam has also explained yesterday. Suffice to say that I am of the view that this Parliament has the duty to set in place constitutional amendments to clarify our definitions of marriage and family.

https://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/#/sprs3topic?reportid=bill-607