Catholic adoption agency loses battle to exclude homosexual prospective parents

The Charity Commission has confirmed its order to the charity Catholic Care to stop restricting its adoption services to heterosexual parents only, despite a High Court ruling in March asking it to reconsider its original decision.

The independent regulator of charities in England and Wales said that it would still not be justified in the circumstances for the charity to discriminate in this way.

In a statement, the Charity Commission said: “The High Court judgment required the Commission to consider the case afresh, and set out the principles it should consider in doing so. These principles included the need to justify the discrimination within Article 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights which deals with the general prohibition of discrimination. Case law indicates that there needs to be ‘particularly convincing and weighty reasons’ as to why any discrimination could be justified.

“The Commission recognises that Catholic Care offers a valuable, high quality adoption service by providing assessment and preparation of people to act as adoptive parents for children being placed by local authorities. However, the Commission concluded that the evidence did not provide sufficiently convincing and weighty reasons to justify the charity’s wish to restrict its service to heterosexual prospective adoptive parents.”

The Charity Commission said that its decision was based on the following factors:

• The interests of children are paramount - the courts have found that it is in the interests of children waiting to be adopted that the pool from which prospective parents are drawn is as wide as possible.
• Discrimination on the ground of sexual orientation is a serious matter because it departs from the principle of treating people equally.
• Local authority evidence suggests that even if the charity were to close its adoption service, children who would have been placed through the charity are likely to be placed through other channels.
• Local authority evidence suggests that they consider gay and lesbian people as suitable prospective parents for hard to place children and that such adoptions have been successful.
• The High Court judgment had found that respect for religious views could not be a justification for discrimination on the ground of sexual orientation in this case, because of the essentially public nature of adoption services.

Andrew Hind, Chief Executive of the Charity Commission, said: “This has been a complex and sensitive decision which the Commission has reached carefully, following the principles set out by the High Court, case law and on the basis of the evidence before us. Clearly the interests of children are paramount.

“In certain circumstances, it is not against the law for charities to discriminate on the grounds of sexual orientation. However, because the prohibition on such discrimination is a fundamental principle of human rights law, such discrimination can only be permitted in the most compelling circumstances. We have concluded that in this case the reasons Catholic Care have set out do not justify their wish to discriminate.”

Catholic Care, which operates in the dioceses of Leeds, Middlesbrough and Hallam in South Yorkshire, was the last Catholic adoption in England and Wales to continue its fight against the regulations after the Roman Catholic Church's campaign to exempt Catholic agencies from the regulations failed.

The Charity Tribunal found against Catholic Care in June last year, but allowed the agency to appeal to the High Court in order to provide a judicial ruling on the correct interpretation of regulation 18 of the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007.

A spokesman for Catholic Care said: “The Charity is very disappointed with the outcome. Catholic Care will now consider whether there is any other way in which the Charity can continue to support families seeking to adopt children in need. In any event, Catholic Care will seek to register as an adoption support agency offering a service to those who were adopted in the past and are now seeking information about their background, and also to support adoptive parents already approved by Catholic Care.”