England’s last remaining Roman Catholic
adoption agency has been granted an appeal in its long-running legal
battle to preserve its religious ethos in the face of sexual orientation
laws.
Leeds-based Catholic Care upholds the Roman Catholic Church’s
teaching on marriage when placing children for adoption with couples.
The charity has been fighting for survival since 2008 when it was
denied permission to enshrine its policy in its official charitable
objects.
Same-sex
Earlier this year the Charity Tribunal said the charity must be willing to provide adoption services to same-sex couples.
The tribunal subsequently ruled in June that it would not accept an appeal against the decision by the Leeds-based charity.
But now Mr Justice Warren has granted Catholic Care permission to
appeal to the Upper Tribunal, which has the same status as the High
Court.
Reasonable
Of the eleven Roman Catholic adoption agencies operating in England
and Wales in 2007, Catholic Care is the only one which has not yet
closed down or dropped its religious ethos because of sexual orientation
laws.
Benjamin James, a solicitor acting on behalf of the agency, said that
Catholic Care would argue its stance was reasonable given that the
alternative was to close the adoption service.
Mr James, of the law firm Bircham Dyson Bell, said that the Upper
Tribunal had decided an appeal would have a “real prospect of success in
establishing that the charity tribunal had erred in law”.
Homosexual
However he cautioned that this was the standard wording issued to all
organisations granted permission to appeal, and did not indicate a
particular likelihood of success.
Opponents of Catholic Care’s policy claim that the charity is acting
unlawfully by not considering homosexual couples.
However, the law gives
some charities the right to restrict services on the basis of sexual
orientation.
A charity can do this if it is attempting to act within its stated aims as set out in its trust deed.