Following last year’s rejection of same sex marriage, a pro-same sex marriage group launched a petition, called a Citizens’ Initiative, which gathered 166,000 signatures. As a result of the action, parliament was forced to discuss the issue.The legal affairs committee rejected the same sex marriage Bill by 10 votes to 6, compared to a 9-8 vote by the same committee in March 2013. Finnish MP Peter Östman, of the Christian Democratic Party, voted against the Bill. He said: ‘We want to preserve the current marriage laws, which define marriage as between a man and a woman.’ The whole Finnish Parliament is expected to debate the legislation in the autumn.