My hon. Friend speaks for the Church of England in this House and his principled objection is that it should have special protections. I frankly do not think that a quadruple lock is necessary; for me a single lock ought to be perfectly satisfactory. He and I will therefore differ on the practicalities of the protections that need to be given to religious organisations. He does not object to the principle that humanists ought to be allowed to carry out marriages—I have not heard him say that—but he is concerned that the consequences might pose a risk to protections for other religious groups to carry out marriages in the way that they want. I hear and understand that argument, but I think that it is probably technically deficient.
In the time that the Bill will take to be considered in another place, and before it returns to the House, it is perfectly possible for all of us who want the Bill to proceed to test these propositions and see whether they undermine the protections that we seek to put in place. I do not believe that they do, and simply asserting that they would does not satisfy me. I want to understand that such arguments have merit. I do not believe that they do, but I am open to considering the arguments further, which is what we should do.