The most senior MP in the Liberal Democrat party in the UK, Sir Alan Beith, says “silly” interpretations of 
equality laws are forcing British Christians to hide their faith.
Sir Alan, the longest-serving Liberal MP since David Lloyd George, is the former deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats and chair of the Commons Justice Select Committee.
He says an over-zealous application of equality laws pressurises Christians to keep their religious views “under wraps”.
He said: “I think that what a lot of people feel now is that they are being asked to hide their religion, that secularism requires not wearing religious symbols.
“I think that what has arisen is that people feeling that not only does the State have to separate itself from religion under secularism, but they are being asked really to hide and keep under wraps their religious views in civil society.
“Sometimes the completely false interpretation of laws, regulations and changes leads to that happening, when it wasn’t even the intention in the first place – a bit like health and safety.
“You get silly things happening, which were not the intention of any legislative change.”
His remarks echo those of Greg Mulholland, another Lib Dem MP, who says he is concerned by a “dangerous drift” in the party.
He was one of a handful of Lib Dem MPs not to support plans to legalise gay marriage in England and Wales.
Mr Mulholland abstained in key votes during the passage of the bill paving the way for same-sex marriages earlier this year, saying different faiths should be able to decide how to define marriage and who the institution should be open to.
But he said there had been a move in his party away from “tolerance, of acceptance of religions and faiths, alongside secular belief systems like humanism, towards a moral conformity” which believed “certain views are part of who we are and that many faith-based Christian views are rather something to be reserved for private worship that should be firmly kept out of political arena”.
He added: “If this trend continues, the Liberal Democrats could no longer be seen as a place where people of faith feel comfortable.”
Meanwhile, at the Lib Dem conference in Glasgow one delegate, Callum Leslie, has called for all Lib Dem MPs who voted against gay marriage to be thrown out of the party.
But Alistair Carmichael, the party’s chief whip, said people have a right to free expression and freedom of religion.