“Civil unrest” on the way because you won’t let us discriminate against gays, warns Lord Carey
A top judge was warned that court rulings against Christian workers risk causing “civil unrest” as he heard the case of a relationship counsellor who was sacked after refusing to give sex advice to homosexual couples.
Gary McFarlane’s barrister said that laws banning discrimination had taken precedence over religious freedoms.
Paul Diamond, who was applying to the Court of Appeal for permission to challenge an employment tribunal ruling which backed the sacking of Mr McFarlane, said: “There will be a collision between the established faith of this land and judicial decisions which will lead to civil unrest.”
He added that laws protecting religious freedom now “counted for nothing” in the courts.
Mr Diamond supported by Lord Carey submitted an application requesting that a specialist panel of five judges with an understanding of religious issues be set up to hear Mr McFarlane’s case and future cases involving religious rights.
They urged senior judges to stand down from future Court of Appeal hearings because of what they claim are “disturbing” rulings in religious discrimination cases.
Lord Carey, in his written statement, said that recent decisions by the courts were “but a short step from the dismissal of a sincere Christian from employment to a religious bar to any employment for Christians”.
The BHA was quick to respond to these comments yesterday, with Head of Public Affairs Naomi Phillips saying “Lord Carey’s distinction between religious and “real” homophobes is false, and should hold no weight in the decisions of our judiciary. He is asking for two laws, one that permits Christians to behave as they want in the workplace, even refusing to provide gay people a public service, and one for everyone else.”
People are free to belive what they want – just not to bring it into the public forum where they have a legal obligation not to discriminate and a legal obligation to comply with their contract of employment. No one is forcing these people to do any particular job. If a company I worked for started doing something legal but which I found personally offensive, I can choose to let it pass or resign. Herendeth the lesson…
Yet again we get the “thin end of the wedge” argument. If you don’t like decision, law, or proposition X, take the ideas within it, push them to the ludicrous extreme (Y), and then say “it’s a short step from X to Y”. You may remember the other classic: “if we allow any kind of assisted suicide there’ll be suicide booths on every street corner and little old ladies will be dragged screaming from their beds”. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a discussion which involved just the relevant ideas at hand…