The Cutting Edge Consortium (CEC) has asked members of the House of Lords to reject a request from Baroness O’Cathain that they should annul the Marriages and Civil Partnerships (Approved Premises) (Amendment) Regulations 2011.

Conservative peer, Baroness O’Cathain, has tabled a ‘prayer’ to force a short debate on – and seeking to annul – the Regulations which would  allow civil partnership ceremonies to be held on religious premises. The debate will be held on Thursday morning, 15 December.

The CEC, which brings together many religious, humanist and secular groups, trades unions, human rights campaigners and others, believes that the change in the law to allow civil partnerships on religious premises is permissive, and urges Peers to reject the prayer motion in order to retain the Regulations.

Both the previous and present governments, and legal experts, including the Legal Office of the General Synod of the Church of England, the government’s lawyers, the Equality and Human Rights Commission, and the opinion of Paul Goulding QC, Blackstone Chambers, have made it expressly clear that no religious group would be liable under the Equality Act 2010 and so could not be forced or compelled to host civil partnerships if it did not want to.

The CEC believes that to annul the Regulations would represent a significant blow to equality and to religious freedom.