Equality Bill

I will not waste time. I shall speak to amendment 32, standing in my name, and to amendment 31, standing in the name of the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Jim Dobbin), who apologises for not being able to be here today. I believe it is fundamental to a democratic society that nobody should be obliged to affirm, participate in, make money out of or promote something that is directly contrary to their conscience or to their religious belief. There is no way that the state should ever compel somebody actively to facilitate something that is against their conscience. Other than in the most extraordinary or deeply extreme circumstances—for example, where there are international hostilities and conscription of the populace—a democratic society recognises the right of people to say, "I will not do that because it is against my conscience." Similarly, a democratic society recognises the right of organisations and groups of people to get together and to set themselves up for the purposes of carrying out something that is based on a community of their belief, which can mean providing services based on that belief. A Catholic adoption agency is set up to place children—sometimes very hard-to-place children—with families, and it is against Catholic teaching, for example, to recognise homosexual unions as equivalent to marriage. By obliging, or attempting to oblige, a Catholic adoption agency to place children with homosexual couples we are effectively suppressing the free practice of religious belief. I have been contacted by a very small Catholic adoption agency which, despite being small, places 10 very hard-to-place children with families each year. Having been in existence for some 40 years, it has placed hundreds of children with families. That agency now says, and we should all be aware of it:""The Charity has suspended the recruitment of new prospective adoptive parents to ensure that the Charity is not in breach of the Regulations or in breach of the tenets of the Church. The Charity cannot continue this suspension of service and will be forced to cease to provide Adoption Services."" That charity is not alone. Westminster Children's Society has closed. Catholic Care is going to close. Other societies are trying to fight but are being defeated in the courts. Only in Scotland has one Catholic agency managed to get a ruling from the court that enables it to continue to place children in accordance with the tenets of the Church. The only other survivor at the moment is an evangelical adoption agency in the north-east that is fighting its corner and saying that it will continue to place children in accordance with the principles that it holds. Of course, Catholic adoption agencies may well supply services to local authorities, but local authorities choose to buy those services; they are not compelled to do so. The adoption agency should therefore not be compelled to go against its tenets. It is not saying, "We want to continue to receive public funding". It is saying, "We want to continue to be able to place children according to the principles that our religion teaches." That is what we are preventing it from doing in law, in Britain, in the 21st century. A free society should accommodate beliefs and respect the right of minorities to hold those beliefs, set up organisations and live their lives according to those beliefs, particularly when they are based not on rejecting a person for being something but on what they actually do. The agency is refusing to place children with homosexual couples who have formed a union that the Church teaches to be wrong. Similarly, for care homes, the problem is obliging the Church to provide double rooms in which unions may take place that are against Catholic teaching. It is not the individual— Debate interrupted (Programme Order, 11 May 2009). The Deputy Speaker put forthwith the Question already proposed from the Chair (Standing Order No. 83E), That the clause be read a Second time. Question agreed to. New clause 41 accordingly read a Second time, and added to the Bill. The Deputy Speaker then put forthwith the Questions necessary for the disposal of the business to be concluded at that time (Standing Order No. 83E).