Equality Bill

My Lords, I never believed that the noble Lord believes that the Church of England has such authority, certainly, the Lords Spiritual do not see it that way but, if he does, he is probably assuring our future in this House for a very long time. The trouble with the subsection about which the noble Lord, Lord Lester, is concerned is that Clause 4 defines nine protected characteristics, including religion and belief and Clause 10 gives a peculiar definition of religion. It states: """Belief means any religious or philosophical belief and a reference to belief includes a reference to a lack of belief"." You are really opening a huge can of worms. The amendment would disapply the advancement of equality of opportunity in relation to the duty of public sectors in the cause of religion and belief. I believe the noble Lord, Lord Lester, is of the view that the duty specified would open doors to giving protection to a plethora of beliefs, religions or lack of them. I have always worried when legislators pass laws in matters of belief where courts might be invited to interpret the doctrines. Courts should be left out of all of that because it is so complicated and difficult. I have some shared concerns with the noble Lord on this issue, mainly over its likely chilling effect for public authorities in their dealings with religious organisations, with people of different beliefs and those of no beliefs at all. I am concerned it could be used to set up all sorts of religions, beliefs or lack of them. People will then say they are being neglected and not having equal opportunity. There are those who worry that if we remove this public duty in relation to religion and belief from the Bill we portray religious freedom as a lesser liberty than others. Is there a way in which we could stop this chilling effect? Perhaps this amendment does not properly address the problem. There are already nine protected characteristics; would the best thing be to simply delete that whole section? Are we setting up a hierarchy? When it comes to religion in terms of immigration, I would sound a caution over whether you would meet the test of the human rights convention. It is very difficult, because I could say tomorrow that I believed in nothing and then claim I believe in a mighty angel that appeared to me in the night, simply because I want to be protected. This is a very wide net. The Church of England is supposed to be a very wide boat, but we do not want to cast the net so wide that we forget there is no more ocean out there. Can the Minister say how we would maintain the protected characteristics without creating this chilling effect for local authorities? Perhaps it needs to be in the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell, about meeting "a need" instead of this equality of opportunity, which is so vast I do not know what it is. I have grave anxieties and I can see local authorities having to be monitored because someone somewhere has claimed that their opportunities are not being met because they have no belief. Then the courts would have to adjudicate. Can the Minister please help us on this?