Proposed changes to Ireland’s Employment Equality Act in the area of religious-run institutions are unnecessary and should not be implemented, the Chairman of the Board of the Iona Institute has said.

Responding to a proposal made by Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, the country’s Minister of State for Equality, to amend legislation – specifically section 37.1 of the Act – to remove the right of Church-backed schools and hospitals to select staff in keeping with religious ethos, Dr John Murray told The Irish Times that should such a move take place, denominational education should be afforded protection.

O Riordain want Section 37.1 amended in light of the passage of the marriage referendum on the grounds, for example, that they have entered into a same-sex union.

Dr Murray said: “There are hundreds of teachers [in Catholic schools] around Ireland who are divorced or remarried,” he pointed out. “There are many teachers who are living together with somebody who aren’t married at all. This happens in loads and loads of cases.”

Describing a “live and let live” attitude in schools, Dr Murray added: “I’m involved in education for the last 30 years and I’m not aware that there’s a major problem about this, in terms of people being sacked or people losing their jobs or people not being able to do their jobs. It simply isn’t true.”

In the wake of Ireland’s recent referendum on same-sex marriage, Minister Ó Ríordáin revealed that the Government is currently working on its amendment to the Employment Equality Act to remove any right of institution to refuse employment based on sexual orientation, even where a body cites that employing the person would undermine its ethos. The Minister asserted that any amendment would “raise the bar of the ‘undermining’ to be so high as to be irrelevant” when considering an employee’s private life.

The Minister expressed the hope that the amendment will be in place by the start of the next school term this September.