Google yaanza kampeni kuunga mkono ndoa za mashoga

GOOGLE has launched an international campaign for gay marriage rights around the world. 

The "Legalise Love" campaign officially started in Singapore and Poland at the weekend, with the tech giant planning to team up with companies and grass-roots campaigners in countries that discriminate against homosexuals.

“We want our employees who are gay or lesbian or transgender to have the same experience outside the office as they do in the office,” Google executive Mark Palmer-Edgecumbe told a global GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender) Workplace Summit in London.

“It is obviously a very ambitious piece of work.”

A Google spokesperson told news.com.au the campaign was not a political one.

"Legalise Love is a campaign to promote safer conditions for gay and lesbian people inside and outside the office in countries with anti-gay laws on the books," the spokesperson said.

In Sydney in March Google hosted a float at the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras and has held two Queer Thinking seminars on "Activism in the Internet Age" and "Queer Careers".

The company has also officially marched in gay pride parades in San Paolo and New York, as well as sponsoring the gay pride "Pink Dot" celebration in Singapore.

Outlining the strategy Mr Palmer-Edgecumbe said Singapore wanted to be a global financial leader but needed to end discrimination based on a person’s orientation.

"We have had a number of instances where we have been trying to hire people into countries where there are these issues and have been unable to put the best person into a job in that country," he said.

In Australia gay people do not have the right to marry, but are recognised as de-facto couples with the same right as straight people living together. 

New South Wales, Tasmania and Victoria grant access to domestic partnership registries. In the Australian Capital Territory gay couples can form civil partnerships.

Sixty-two per cent of Australians support gay marriage according to a February Galaxy poll, however Prime Minister Julia Gillard has remained adamant that marriage should be defined as the union between a man and a woman.

In 2004, Former Prime Minister John Howard successfully amended the Australian Marriage Act and Australian Family Act to be defined as "the union of a man and a woman to exclusion of all others".

On Friday former Opposition Leader and shadow minister for communications and broadband, Malcolm Turnbull, made a speech at Southern Cross University encouraging the Government to legalise civil unions for the GLBT community.

"We should not miss the opportunity to legislate for civil unions for same sex couples in this parliament," Mr Turnbull said.

"I recognise that will be seen by many as not good enough.

"But it is better than nothing and, as I said in the House last week on another issue, it is a great mistake to allow your conception of the perfect to be the enemy of the good."