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Equality Bill

My Lords, I accept what the noble Lord says and I will look into this again. However, there are still Catholic adoption agencies and they continue to provide an excellent service to those couples who wish to adopt through a faith-based agency. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bradford said that there must be space for Catholic couples to choose to adopt from a Catholic adoption agency. I agree with that, as long as those agencies comply with the law. The noble Lord, Lord Patten, asked why the rights of those seeking to adopt in the context of a Catholic ethos are thought less important than same-sex couples. This is not about creating a hierarchy of rights. The Equality Bill has to strike a fair balance between religious freedom and the rights of people who are lesbian, gay or bisexual. There is nothing to prevent Catholic agencies from treating heterosexual couples consistently with their beliefs. All that they are prevented from doing is treating people less favourably because of their sexual orientation. The noble Lord raised the question of the debating time given to the existing regulations. That point was also mentioned by the noble and learned Baroness. The Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007 were subject to the affirmative procedure and debated in both Houses. I hear what the noble Lord said about four minutes in the other place and I do not wish to comment on that, but I know from my noble friend sitting beside me that the regulations were properly debated in this House. In the Ladele case, it was not that there was no registrar available but rather that the local authority in question had a dignity and respect policy that required all registrars to conduct both civil marriages and civil partnership ceremonies. The court decided that the application of the policy was legitimate and the means of achieving it proportionate. I apologise if earlier I misled the House when I referred to that case. The noble Lord, Lord Low, suggested accepting the spirit of the amendment in the interests of tolerance. We would never allow a person to have a conscientious objection on the grounds of race or disability, so why is sexual orientation different? I believe that we are a tolerant Government and a tolerant Parliament and that the law as it stands is a tolerant law. I believe that the new paragraph proposed in the amendment tabled by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, would allow discrimination to embed itself where it has no place and I do not believe that that would be right in a tolerant society. Therefore, I urge the noble and learned Baroness to withdraw her amendment.