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Equality Bill

The hon. Gentleman invites me to make a distinction—I am happy to do so—between people's ability to express their religious views wherever and whenever in employment, which, as the Court of Appeal has said, can be legitimately restricted without its being either direct or indirect discrimination. I urge him to read the Court of Appeal's judgment in the case of Eweida from beginning to end, because it is absolutely clear on that point, but that is separate from what should concern all of us: the possibility of people who use a service—whether a public service or, particularly, a commercial service—taking offence at someone's expression of religious views. We cannot have that, and despite the Minister's normal bluster, she has not explained why, if this measure was not necessary, it has been brought in. A problem will be created when people read that the fact that there is no provision on harassment on the grounds of religion""does not prevent conduct relating to that characteristic from amounting to a detriment for the purposes of discrimination within section 13"." It might well be that a detriment is a higher threshold than that for a harassment claim, and that is dealt with in detail in an article by Michael Rubenstein in the March 2010 Equal Opportunities Review, which I commend to the Minister. The article points out, inter alia, that the threshold is not greatly different, and I am worried that even hypersensitive people whose cases would fail in the first instance will bring forward such cases because of sensitivity.