Two members of the Queensland parliament voted against the change: Shane Knuth (left), and Robbie Katter, both of Katter's Australian Party.

I rang Knuth to ask him why. Here's what he said.

Me: Why did yourself and Robbie Katter vote against the equal age of consent laws?

Knuth: We’ve always been very consistent in, you know, our position, when it comes to, you know, same-sex marriage, or, or… what’s the other one? Same-sex marriage. Civil unions! And, you know, we just feel that, you know, we’d be hypocritical to support the removal of aged consent for anal sex.

Why do you think the age of consent for anal sex is like same-sex marriage?

Basically, we just do not support that position. We have constantly said a relationship should be between a male and a female, a man and a woman. We have taken a very strong position on that in the past.

Sure. So do you think that anal sex between men at any age should be criminalised?

I’m not commenting on that, but just that we, you know, believe a relationship should be between a man and a woman. We’ve always stood our ground on this. And we also moved the amendment in the house back three years ago, that relationships should be between a man and a woman.

I guess what I’m, what I'm trying to understand here is why specifically you think the age of consent should not be equal to the heterosexual age of consent, if you don’t think it should be criminalised the whole way through. I'm just trying to understand that position.

We just don’t believe in it full stop. Whether it’s 16, 20, 18, we don’t believe it in full stop.

