Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2003

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 8:30 pm on 17 June 2003.

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Photo of Lord Pilkington of Oxenford Lord Pilkington of Oxenford Conservative 8:30, 17 June 2003

My Lords, there is a fundamental problem. There are human rights, and there are corporate rights. Everyone has supported the idea that faith communities can choose the people they employ. In Hitler's Germany, he destroyed faith communities, and the state decided who they could employ. It is a fundamental tenet of modern democracy that the communities within the state, be they trade unions or Churches, can decide whom to admit. The state does not decide that. My Lords, you may disagree with them; you may find them a narrow, funny lot—but it is their right. The noble Baroness sat on the European committee, as I did, together with many European Union members. England is not alone in this. A lot of other people have said that they are not prepared to accept that a faith community should be dictated to by the state—by people who have no commitment to their religion. I do not know what the religion of the noble Lord, Lord Lester, is, but I do not think that it is mine.

It is crucial that we allow derogation in this matter. It is being allowed in Germany, Ireland and a lot of other countries. Why should we not do it? People do not have to be cleaners in the Anglican church or the Jewish synagogue. You may think that they are bizarre or from the Planet Zor, but they are entitled. If we do not watch out, we will stray into the secularisation seen in France in the late 19th century, when the state started to dictate to the Church what it could do. They could not have monks or things like that.

Therefore, it is terribly important that the Government stand firm on this issue, together with the governments of a number of European Union countries. I do not have the advantage of the research team of the noble Lord, Lord Lester, so I cannot furnish my argument with quotes, but corporations within the state have a fundamental right to their own identity and we must support that.