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Charities Bill [Lords]

Just as the Government do not get drawn into giving lists of examples—rightly so—I am not going to be. The understanding of the definition of belief in the Human Rights Act, which is the definition that I have proposed and that the Government use in all other legislation, clearly does not cover political belief systems. There is not a shred of jurisprudence to suggest that it ever would. The definition is meant to refer, does refer, and is understood to refer, to rationalist and humanist belief systems, for example. I am not an expert in these matters. We all have other things to be getting on with rather than worrying about the meaning of life, even at a time like this. However, the people who are affected have written to express their views. There will be humanists and rationalists in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. I know that he will think about these things deeply before deciding whether to opt for a discriminatory, or apparently discriminatory, approach, and he will have their interests and feelings in his mind as he decides his position. I want to cover what the Joint Committee on Human Rights has said and then I will draw my remarks to a close. The Committee was clear in its scrutiny of the draft Charities Bill. In paragraph 5.23 of its report of 1 November 2004—its 20th report of that Session—it stated, after setting out the Government’s response that they were satisfied that organisations advancing non-religious beliefs would not be disadvantaged under the Bill as currently drafted:"““We remain of the view that Convention compliance could best be supported by including the advancement of non-religious beliefs as a charitable purpose under clause 2(2)(c)””—" I believe that that is still clause 2(2)(c) several versions later—"““and we draw this matter to the attention of both Houses.””" The Committee went on to comment on that in its report on the Charities Bill in the last Session. It set out its detailed argument in paragraphs 3.11 to 3.15. I will not repeat that, but the Committee did want to reiterate the following point, in paragraph 3.15:"““Whilst we appreciate that clause 2(2)(l)””—" —now clause 2(2)(m), which refers to the subsection (4) catch-all—"““is capable of application in the way suggested by the government, we remain of the view that protection of Article 9 rights on an equal basis could most effectively and clearly be ensured by provision on the face of the Bill, expressly extending clause 2(2)(c) to cover all religious and non-religious organisations which promote systems of belief. As we stated in our report on the draft Bill, at a minimum, guidelines under the Bill must clarify that organisations advancing all forms of both religious and non-religious beliefs protected by Article 9 would be accorded recognition under either clause 2(2)(c) or clause 2(2)(l) on an equal basis.””" If guidelines are going to say, ““Use clause 2(2)(c) to cover non-religious belief systems,”” why not just include ““religion or belief”” and make the statute look like what the guidance needs to be? Finally, the Joint Committee on Human Rights returned to the matter in its latest report on the subject, the first report of the 2005-06 Session. It recognised that there had been some improvement, because a definition of religion had been included. I want to record on behalf of the Committee, informally, our recognition that that was done. In paragraph 1.8, the Committee states:"““We welcome the broad definition of religion in clause 2(3)(a), as supporting the Article 9 and Article 14 rights of those promoting non-theistic or multi-theistic religions. However we ""support the conclusion of the previous committee that, whilst compatibility with Article 9 and Article 14 could be achieved in practice””—" I believe that that is arguable—by application of the catch-all"““as proposed by the government, such compliance would best be assured by a definition which extended to non-religious belief systems falling within the protection of Article 9 ECHR. We draw this to the attention of both Houses.””" We thus have not only arguments of principle, but the fact that the default is to use a definition such as that proposed. We also have three recommendations of the Joint Committee, which was set up by Parliament to advise it on human rights and discrimination, and a practical impact—and we have heard in return no convincing arguments of principle from the Government about why they are not doing what I propose. The problem is that there will be attempts—amendment No. 126, which was tabled by the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe), is an example—to treat religion as not requiring a public benefit test. If that were ever to come to pass it would clearly breach article 14, which addresses the duty of non-discrimination in respect of rights enjoyed under article 9, and exacerbate the existing system. The Government could solve such problems by accepting my amendments today. May I speak briefly to Government amendment No. 3? I have a close association with the British Chess Federation, which has lobbied the Minister hard on the need not to have a provision in the Bill that would exclude the federation a priori from justifying its pursuit, which is enjoyed by many disabled and elderly people, as a sport of the mind. The federation would wish me to put on record its thanks to the Government and the Minister, who will have free entry to any chess club—and they are pretty wild places—and to the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Turner) for raising the matter in Committee. The Government have done a good thing by tabling that amendment, so I hope that they will also do a good thing for the humanists, not all of whom play chess.