Services funded by public money should be open to all, without alienating anyone.
The recent drive to contract out public services to faith groups risks undermining equal access.
Help us keep public services free from discrimination and evangelism.
The government is increasingly pushing for more publicly-funded services to be provided by religious organisations.
Many faith-based groups have carried out social service without imposing their beliefs. But religious groups taking over public service provision raises concerns regarding proselytising and discrimination.
65% of people have no confidence in church groups running crucial social provisions such as healthcare with only 2% of people expressing a lot of confidence.
Any organisations involved in delivering public services should be bound by equality law and restrictions on proselytisation.
Those advocating for faith organisations to take over more public services risk undermining these restrictions, which exist to protect both the public and third sector.
"We have concerns that some religious groups that seek to take over public services, particularly at local level, could pursue policies and practices that result in increased discrimination against marginalised groups, particularly in service provision and the employment of staff. Non-religious people and those not seen to confirm to the dominant ethos of a religious body, such as being in an unmarried relationship or divorced and being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered, could find themselves subject to discrimination."
Unitarian Church (Submission to the Parliamentary Public Administration Select Committee about the Big Society agenda)
There are also concerns about faith-based mental health and pastoral care in public institutions, including chaplaincy programmes in the NHS and the armed forces. Where such services are funded by the state, they should not be organised around religion or belief.
Religious commentators are often keen to document the contribution of religious organisations to the third sector and social activism. But they fail to demonstrate why it should be the state's role to build this capacity or why local authorities shouldn't have legitimate concerns about religious groups running services.
Take Action!
1. Write to your MP
Ask your MP to protect secular public services.
2. Share your story
Tell us why you support this campaign, and how you are personally affected by the issue. You can also let us know if you would like assistance with a particular issue.
3. Join the National Secular Society
Become a member of the National Secular Society today! Together, we can separate religion and state for greater freedom and fairness.
Latest updates
NSS welcomes ruling on Christian foster agency case
Posted: Fri, 24 Sep 2021 16:44
The National Secular Society has welcomed a judgment upholding a ruling that a Christian fostering agency cannot reject same-sex couples.
The Court of Appeal today upheld a previous ruling that inspectors were correct to penalise Cornerstone (North East) Adoption and Fostering Service for failing to comply with the Equality Act 2010.
Ofsted, which inspects childcare, adoption and fostering agencies, downgraded Cornerstone from "good" to "requires improvement" in 2019 because the charity requires carers "to refrain from homosexual conduct".
In 2020 Justice Julian Knowles ruled this policy unlawful. He said the law "requires Cornerstone to accept gay men and lesbian women as potential foster carers".
Exemptions in the Equality Act which allow religious organisations to discriminate against gay people in some circumstances do not apply because Cornerstone performs functions on behalf of public authorities, the judge said.
Cornerstone appealed the decision at the Court of Appeal in June.
Judge's comments
Cornerstone's representatives claimed the initial ruling was incorrect, because it was "contradictory" to allow the agency to only accept evangelical Christian parents as carers but to prevent them from discriminating against carers that engage in "sexual conduct outside the bonds of a Christian marriage."
But Lord Justice Peter Jackson of the Court of Appeal said the "difficulty" with this logic is that it "equates religious discrimination with sexual orientation discrimination in all circumstances when that is something that Parliament has not done".
He said Justice Knowles "was not obliged to adopt Cornerstone's doctrinal definition of evangelical Christians so as to find that gay and lesbian evangelical Christians are not merely unidentified but non-existent".
That would be "to substitute the precepts of the faith for the reality," he said.
He added: "If gay evangelical Christians wishing to foster are few and far between, it is no doubt to some extent because of those precepts, and not because people like that do not exist."
Speaking of the importance of the Equality Act, he said it "must be recognised that religious doctrine does not stand still" and that the law "is entitled to have regard to the rights of those who might wish to be free of a discriminatory practice currently endorsed by their faith."
In his concluding remarks, he said because of the "detrimental impact on society and on individuals" of discrimination against gay people, we should be "slow to accept that prohibiting fostering agencies from discriminating against homosexuals is a disproportionate limitation on their right to manifest their religion."
NSS reaction
NSS head of policy and research Megan Manson said the ruling was "a welcome affirmation of LGBT+ equality."
She said: "We are relieved that the Court of Appeal has upheld the previous ruling: that religion cannot be used by foster agencies to justify discrimination against same-sex couples.
"As the judge said, discriminating against people because of who they love is detrimental to individuals and to society. For this reason, religious fundamentalism must not be allowed to trump equality law."
About Cornerstone
Cornerstone is an evangelical Christian registered charity which says it provides an "adoption and fostering child care service according to Christian principles". It is funded primarily from payments made by local authorities when they place a child for fostering.
Its policy for foster carers stipulates they must attend church regularly, and avoid "all sexual sins" including cohabitation and "wilful violation of your birth sex", in addition to "homosexual behaviour".
Freedom of Information requests made by the NSS in 2020 revealed that Sunderland City Council made 33 referrals to Cornerstone between 2015 and April 2020. They had two foster placements with Cornerstone. Northumberland County Council made 30 referrals.
The NSS also found Durham County Council gave Cornerstone a total of £17,294 in 2017-18.
NSS: council should tackle discriminatory school admissions in review
Posted: Wed, 5 Aug 2020 16:22
The National Secular Society has called on Liverpool City Council to consider the impact of discriminatory admissions policies in faith schools as it reviews its policies towards school admissions.
Last week the council set up a panel to consider how rules on admissions disadvantage children from ethnic and religious minority backgrounds.
The review comes after a group of Muslim parents in the city said admissions criteria for faith schools and academies nearby meant their children often ended up having to travel long distances to school.
The parents also said some of the girls had faced anti-Muslim abuse on the journey.
In a letter to Barbara Murray, the council's cabinet member for education, the NSS welcomed the review and recommended steps which the council could take to improve access to inclusive schools.
Contents of NSS letter
The NSS said the council should:
- Consider the impact of faith schools in restricting school choice and suitability as it monitors local school provision.
- Explicitly tell the government that it would prefer inclusive community schools if new schools were required in Liverpool.
- Ensure the admissions policies for existing voluntary controlled faith schools, where councils are the admissions authority, did not endorse religious discrimination.
- Ensure its wider policies supported inclusive schooling and prioritised social cohesion.
The NSS also highlighted evidence that local families had been affected by discriminatory admissions policies:
- The society is currently working with a parent in Liverpool who is concerned that her child with special educational needs may not be able to access a suitable non-faith school.
- Elsewhere a family in the city was unable to send their child to a school just five metres from their house because they didn't attend the local church.
- NSS supporters in Liverpool have noted that many local parents attend church just to secure a place at a convenient school.
NSS comment
NSS head of education Alastair Lichten said the council should "take this opportunity to make Liverpool's schools more inclusive".
"The council is rightly concerned that school admissions processes may be exacerbating racial and social inequalities. It's unjustifiable that some children have to travel across the city to school and appalling that some have faced anti-Muslim abuse while doing so.
"Admissions policies in faith schools are unfair and far too complex nationally, and that needs national attention. But there are a series of practical steps available to councillors which would help to defend inclusive community schooling and make children more welcome. We urge them to take them."
Need for national response
The NSS's letter also noted that many necessary changes to address the problem would need to be addressed at national level.
In 2018 a government-commissioned report found that poorer pupils and pupils from ethnic minority backgrounds were significantly less likely to get into church schools than their counterparts.
A 2018 report from the NSS, The Choice Delusion, also highlighted the ways faith schools impede on school choice for many families, including through discriminatory admissions policies.
