UK: Update on Gay Rights Legislation

THE LAW covering church employment will stay as it is, the Minister for Women and Equality, Harriet Harman, said on Tuesday. She was speaking after the defeat in the Lords of an amendment to the Equality Bill (News, 29 January), which sought to clarify the exemption for religious bodies from the existing legislation, to ensure that it applied only to church ministers.

In a statement, Ms Harman said: “Employment and non-discrimination law applies to religious organisations when they employ people in non-religious jobs in the same way that it does to all other employers. We have never insisted on non-discrimination legislation applying to religious jobs such as being a vicar, a bishop, an imam, or a rabbi.”

She continued: “We thought that it would be helpful for everyone involved to clarify the law, and that is what the amendment that we brought forward aimed to do. That amend ment was rejected. So the law remains as it was.”

Full Story from the Church Times
Click here for gay marriage resources in England.
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