COALITION OPPOSES RELGIOUS EXEMPTION FROM EQUALITY BILL

News by Simon McD on December 14, 2009 at 11:58 am

A coalition of UK faith-based and non-religious social justice organisations, civic groups, trades unions and professional associations is calling on the House of Lords to reject wide exemptions for religious organizations at its second reading of the Equality Bill on 15 December 2010.

Founder-member Maria Exall from the Cutting Edge Consortium (CEC) said: “It is vital that progressive faith and secular voices are heard loud and clear supporting the Equality Bill and equal rights for LGBT people.”

She added: “Parliament must understand that many members in good standing in a variety of faith communities do not share the views expressed in public by some religious leaders. We urge the House of Lords to stand firm for justice and equality at this time.”

The Consortium has provided a briefing for members of the House of Lords, across various parties. CEC’s Steering Group will also be meeting senior Government representatives to voice their concerns about any widening of Schedule 9, Clauses 2 and 3, and Schedule 22 of the Bill.

The coalition has welcomed the European Commission’s recent “reasoned opinion” requesting strict compliance of Clause 2 with the European Directive 2000/78/EC. CEC believes the “religious ethos argument” in Clause 3 should not be used as a back-door mechanism for allowing additional discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation.

CEC also objects to Schedule 22 which allows religious requirements to be placed on many staff in faith schools despite the absence of any Genuine Occupational Requirement.

The Cutting Edge Consortium has been built on ground-breaking 2007 & 2009 Conferences on Faith, Homophobia, Transphobia & Human Rights, opening up new possibilities of dialogue between a huge diversity of interests in order to support the Equality Bill.

Tags: European Commission, House of Lords, Human Rights, Human Rights and Liberties, LGBT, Sexual orientation, Social justice, Trade union

Ronan

i wish that the government would listen to this and have the balls to push though the equality bill without the religious exemption.

i'm beginning though to suspect that Gordon Brown is not as committed to a "progressive" agenda as Tony Blair was. Something to do with being "a son of the manse" I wonder?

And you can be damn sure the Tories won't if they get into power. Despite Cameron's bleating about inclusiveness , deep down, or not even deep down in some cases, they are still bigoted and don't quite grasp the idea of equality.

The fight goes on!