Romania’s ruling Social Democrats hope to organize this autumn a referendum to restrict the constitutional definition of family, which would effectively rule out the possibility of legalizing same-sex marriage, party leader Liviu Dragnea said on Saturday. The plan for a referendum came about after the Coalition for the Family, a civil society group, collected 3 million signatures last year in favor of changing the constitutional definition of marriage as a union strictly between a man and a woman from the existing “spouses.”

Under Romanian law, the constitution can be changed after a proposal by the president, the government, a quarter of all lawmakers or at least 500,000 citizens. Parliament must approve any revision, which must then pass a nationwide referendum.

The Coalition for the Family also supports cancelling subsidies for contraception and elective abortion, forcing parents of minors to have counseling if they want to divorce, and lowering some taxes for married couples. Restricting the definition of family based on a marriage between man and woman also would hurt single parents, non-married couples and other non-traditional parenting units, rights groups have said. Read more via Reuters