Australian-born British rights activist Peter Tatchell has slammed the British Government for announcing a transition to marriage equality which he said could take as long as 2017.

On February 17 UK Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone announced that the UK’s Equalities Act would be amended to allow civil partnership ceremonies to be held in places of worship, and that a consultation process on extending civil partnerships to heterosexuals and civil marriage to same-sex couples would be undertaken.

“Over the past few months I’ve spoken to a lot of LGB and T people and campaign groups, and it quickly became clear that there is a real desire to address the differences between civil marriage and civil partnerships,” Featherstone said.

“We are going to be the first British government to formally look at what steps can be taken to address this.”

Featherstone has been reported as stating that this consultation process would be complete within the life of the current Parliament. The next UK general election must be held by June 11 2015.

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