Equality Bill

Amendment 101ZA seeks to make a relatively minor amendment to the part of the Bill that lays down requirements relating to religion or belief. Paragraph 3(a) uses the words, ""it is an occupational requirement"." I want it to say, "it is a genuine occupational requirement". I do not suppose that anyone can really disagree with that, although we shall have to wait and see. The next amendment in the group relates to a rather more complicated issue. The intention behind it is to limit the ability of an employer with a religious ethos to require that an employee should be an adherent of a particular religion, normally the employer’s own. The Bill provides for certain exceptions to be permissible in limited circumstances, but I do not see why an exception of any kind should be permitted when the employer in question provides a public service. This may increasingly come to be the case, as there seem to be arrangements in hand for charitable and religious organisations to take on responsibility for services that are normally provided by public—mainly welfare—services. Such services would normally have equal opportunities policies for their employees. There is no reason why a religious or charitable organisation that undertakes work in the public arena that is funded by the taxpayer should be able to insist that the employees who carry out the work should be of a particular religion. That is surely unfair and against the general ethos of the Bill. Amendment 101C, my final amendment in the group, would insert after line 31 on the same page of the Bill: ""The exception under paragraph 3 shall not be used to justify discrimination on any other protected ground"." That is important, because we are talking here only about religion and belief and we do not want discrimination against characteristics that are already protected quite specifically in the Bill—sexual orientation, disability and so on—to be possible somehow or other in this provision. That needs to be taken account of. I do not know why Amendment 125A, in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, has been included in this group of amendments. I do not know what it intends, but it appears to relate to sexual orientation, which is one of the protected characteristics in the Bill. It is not appropriate for this group of amendments, but I shall listen with interest to what the noble and learned Lord has to say in support of it. On the face of it, I do not agree with it. The noble Lord, Lord Lester, has tabled a very similar amendment to mine. Again, I wait with interest to hear what he has to tell us, but my view is quite simple: a religious organisation that gives a public service does not have the right to insist that its employees should be of that religion. It is a very simple point and I beg to move.