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Human Rights

My Lords, I am very glad to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker. I do not have her longstanding experience in these matters any more than I have the legal expertise of the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, whom I warmly congratulate on initiating the debate. I am very glad to take part in it and I hope he is not too alarmed to know that I agree with quite a lot of what he said. I enter the debate with some temerity, being neither a lawyer nor an expert. I suppose I am just a representative of the average Back-Bench Peer in the street. I take heart from what I have heard a noble friend of the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill—the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, who is not in his place—say in a debate earlier this month. On quite a technical issue, up popped the figure of my noble friend Lady Knight of Collingtree—she too is not in the Chamber—and, although the debate was technical, she got right to the heart of the matter. The noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, said it was a very good thing—I quote from memory but more or less exactly—that these issues were not left to barristers or to experts and that it was sometimes right to have an outside view. One of the most memorable things, among many, that the noble Lord, Lord Lester, said is that some issues are too important to be left to barristers. With respect, the issue of human rights is one of them. This afternoon, I model myself on my noble friend Lady Knight, which may surprise some noble Lords. In doing so, I warn those Members of the House who are of a delicate disposition that there may be some criticism of the nature of current liberal thought in what I say. I do not mean Liberal Democrat political thought but liberal thought in its general, metropolitan sense. There is even a risk of criticism of that conveniently self-canonising set of latter-day secular saints; the self-styled human rights lawyers. Of course, I do not refer, under any circumstance, to anyone in your Lordships' Chamber this afternoon. It may well occur to some, who are legally trained or who have greater experience than I have, that something I say—I shall concentrate entirely on religious freedoms—may be covered by this article of the European Convention on Human Rights, or that clause of an Act of Parliament. If any Member pops up to ask, ““Don’t you know that?””, I am quite likely to say, ““No, I do not know that””. You will not get a very smart answer, if tempted. Following something that the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, said about atheists, agnostics and people who are not of faith but who have deeply held ethical views, I am the first to admit that for hundreds, if not thousands of years, until very recently, the Christians in the UK were more or less top dogs, disapproving of atheists, agnostics and those who were not of faith—the secular. That is totally wrong. It is absolutely right that in this place we should consider the ethical stance and views of those who belong to the British Humanist Association or whatever. I would be very interested to hear people speak on ““Thought for the Day””, even if the lurking Conservative in me says, ““Bring back ‘Lift up Your Hearts’””. None the less, I would wish to hear that voice and I would respect it. Things are the other way around now. These days, the seculars rule the roost and it seems to me, by some sort of reverse act of God, that sometimes the religiously inclined find or perceive themselves to be the new oppressed, rightly or wrongly—a minority needing the help of true liberals. Alas, in the sometimes suffocating atmosphere of contemporary liberalism, we see the beginnings of what I perceive as a form of soft secular totalitarianism. It is an approach that is absolutely tone deaf to nuance. It wishes, rather, to categorise, is often against any diversity that offends the contemporary fashionable secular creed of the day, and participates in rhetoric rather than reality. The problem is that an increasing number of those of religious orientation, whether Christian or from any other faith group, feel that they are simply being denied the right to be themselves. That perception may be wrong, but it is there and should not be dismissed. This was neatly summed up in a letter that arrived on my desk out of the blue on 10 March from a correspondent in Glasgow whom I do not know. I have not sought her permission to use her name, but I will quote from her letter. For the avoidance of doubt and to help, as always, our hardworking Hansard writers, who have never made a mistake in my speeches—so the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, must have been joking in his speech—I begin: "““I believe that the right to religious freedom is a fundamental human right, which recognises the right of the human person to act in accordance with his/ her conscience. Moreover, I believe that religious bodies have a right to manifest their religious beliefs by establishing and maintaining institutions and services in accordance with those religious beliefs and values””." I—a non-expert, non-human-rights lawyer—could not have written better. Sometimes, the new and also sometimes militant secularism that seeks, little by little, to force a new morality on our churches, does not act in the most balanced way and needs the help of the liberal human rights lawyer. The role of the state is truly over-reached when it tramples on legitimate moral freedoms. There is an urgent need to revisit the protection of religious minorities in the United Kingdom. It may be that some noble Lords may say that the list of five areas I am about to give is covered by this or that bit of whatever Act or European Convention. However, we need to revisit them to ensure that those assertions are true. First, we need to revisit the fact that religious freedom is a fundamental human right, grounded in the dignity of the individual, which recognises the right of woman or man to act in accordance with their conscience. Secondly, individuals should not be restrained in any way from acting in accordance with their religious beliefs. Thirdly, all religious bodies should have the right to demonstrate and teach their religious beliefs. I am talking here about all religious bodies. Further to my earlier remarks in response to the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, that should include those who have strong ethical feelings, but come from non-religious bodies. Fourthly, religious bodies should have the unfettered right to establish and maintain institutions and services that reflect their beliefs and values. That is, I know, a contentious point that has been much in noble Lords’ minds in recent days, but it is important to revisit it to make sure that the balance between secular and religious society is right. Fifthly, the Government do not have the right to inhibit acts of religion or to force people to act contrary to their conscience in a proper exercise of religious freedoms. The time has come for those interested in human rights—even those of the most secular bent of mind—to revisit these issues in the interests of what are now an increasingly small minority in this country. Overweening and overbearing secularism should not be allowed to trump religious freedom on any occasion. I borrow from Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, who said that we may be reaching a position in our present law-making where there is no space for the Christian conscience. True liberals, of all political beliefs and none, would surely wish to see that space provided and protected. Mention of the Roman Catholic cardinal leads me to my last point and to declare my adherence to that faith. On the statute book of this country, we still have an absolutely disgraceful discrimination specifically aimed at Roman Catholics, and over which there is generally a deafening silence from the secularists and human rightists. There is not much campaigning from them on this issue here or in the other place. There are four such statutes, which I shall enumerate: the Coronation Oath Act 1668; the Act of Settlement 1701; the Act of Union 1707; the Accession Declaration Act 1910. These all have provisions preventing Roman Catholics or those married to Roman Catholics acceding to the Throne—some protection for the human rights and fundamental freedoms of Roman Catholics in those statues, which Parliament forces on the monarchy. The Government should have acted on this long ago. I asked the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor a Question a few weeks ago and in his Written Answer he told me: "““The Government currently have no plans to bring forward legislation on this issue””.—[Official Report, 5/3/07; col. WA 6.]" Will the Minister please tell the House this afternoon why not? Will she also reflect on the insulting discriminatory nature of this approach to the Roman Catholic community in the United Kingdom, perhaps pausing on the difficulties that this can cause Roman Catholics in public life? I give one entirely theoretical, but entirely plausible, example of this. Suppose that the heir to the monarch of the day—I talk of any day—wishes to marry the Roman Catholic son or daughter of an equally Roman Catholic privy counsellor. The monarch of the day, under the force of the four statutes that I have enumerated, will be forced to say that, while continuing to welcome the advice and loyalty of the Roman Catholic privy counsellor parent, because of what we gratuitously left on the statute book, the new son or daughter-in-law is unwelcome as consort to the heir to the throne. So in our statute book, we enshrine Roman Catholics as second-class citizens. This is swept under the carpet, particularly by some in the liberal and legal human rights area. Parliament urgently needs to free the monarchy from this disgraceful discriminatory nonsense. Those most involved should recognise the burden that this places on Roman Catholic privy counsellors from time to time. My second and last request to the Minister is that she undertakes to draw my remarks to the attention of the Lord President of the Council, who can expedite a meeting of privy counsellors to discuss these issues. I say only to all in this place who really care for human rights, that I hope that they will be as vigorous on this issue as they quite properly are on the issues of sex, age and racial discrimination.