My Lords, I wish to address a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Lester. In the debate in the House of Commons on 20 May, the Government committed to consider this issue further in the Lords. As a consequence of that, and of all the evidence that was received, the Joint Committee stated:
“In particular, we encourage the Government to consider whether specific protections are required for faith schools and for individual teachers who hold a religious belief about same sex marriage”.
I do not think the situation is quite as clear as might have been suggested.