I may have been wrong to condemn Christian B&B owners, admits top judge
A JUDGE who condemned a Christian couple for turning away gay guests from their hotel yesterday said her decision may have been wrong. Supreme Court deputy president Baroness Hale called for a rethink on religious and gay rights six months after she rejected the B&B owners’ arguments in a key test case.
Lady Hale said in a speech that the law has done too little to protect the beliefs of Christians. And she cast doubts over her own judgment in the landmark case in which a gay couple sued Christian hoteliers Peter and Hazelmary Bull.
Mr Bull, 74, and his 70-year- old wife refused a double room at their Cornish hotel to Steven Preddy and Martyn Hall in 2008 because they were not a married heterosexual couple.
They politely turned the gay couple away, and paid them the difference in price when they found a room in another hotel.
But the incident led to a string of court cases, which culminated in defeat for the Bulls at the Supreme Court – where Lady Hale, leading four other judges, ruled that the rights of the gay couple should outweigh the conscience of the Christian couple.
Lady Hale declared in her Supreme Court ruling that we should be ‘slow to accept’ the right of Christians to discriminate against gay people.
But in March she began to acknowledge that the laws which ignore Christian consciences might not be ‘sustainable’.
Last week, in a highly unusual
Christian beliefs: Peter Bull and his wife Hazelmary move, Lady Hale and her fellow should perhaps develop a judges ordered that the Bulls will ‘conscience clause’ for Christians not be liable for legal costs – a like the Bulls. decision which spares them a huge And she said that in recent years bill which would have paid for the Christians have been complaining lawyers who represented Mr of ‘new forms of unfair treatment’, Preddy and Mr Hall. adding: ‘I am not sure our law has
And in a speech to Irish lawyers found a reasonable accommoda-yesterday, she gave a strong indication of all these different strands.’ tion that her judgment against the She went on to say: ‘An example Bulls might have been too harsh, of treatment which Christians may asking whether the courts would feel to be unfair is the recent case be better off taking a ‘ more of Bull v Hall. nuanced approach’. ‘Should we be developing, in both
Lady Hale suggested that the law human rights and EU law, an explicit requirement upon providers of employment, goods and services to make reasonable accommodation for the manifestation of religious beliefs?’
Last year the Bulls were on the point of selling their hotel, Chymorvah House in Marazion.
However they said they have managed to stay in business thanks to help from their supporters.
Mrs Bull said: ‘It is too late for us now, but we are glad the issue hasn’t gone away.
‘It is being debated and there may be an opportunity for more balance to be brought into this.
‘We have no quarrel with the two men. But the pendulum has swung too far one way. In our society, why can’t two lifestyles find a way to live together?’
And Colin Hart, from the Christian Institute, said: ‘The law has ignored the religious liberty of Christians. Everybody seems to have liberty but Christians.’
He added: ‘The penny is beginning to drop among judges that the law is unfair. When it has come to a conflict between religious rights and gay rights, gay rights have won every time.
‘I hope the Supreme Court will now find some more room to protect Christian consciences.’