Courts should have done more to protect Christians affected by equality laws, the Equality and Human Rights 
Commission has said.
In a significant development, the commission says judges have interpreted laws too narrowly, and set the bar too high for Christians to prove discrimination against them.
The commission also thinks employers should do more to “reasonably accommodate” employees with religious beliefs.
It is a considerable shift in emphasis at the commission, which has in the past appeared to be hostile to religious liberty cases brought by Christians.
In a previous case, one lawyer for the commission suggested that Christian foster carers are a risk because they may ‘infect’ children.
In another instance, the commission funded a case against Christian B&B owners who restricted double rooms to married couples. When the commission won, its lawyers demanded a harsher penalty against the Christians.
And recently the commission’s chairman, Sir Trevor Phillips, caused damage when he said Christians were more militant than Muslims in making discrimination claims.
But now the Commission has announced that it will intervene – for the benefit of religious people and others – in four religious liberty cases heading for the European Court of Human Rights.
One of the cases is that of Lillian Ladele, a Christian registrar who was disciplined by bosses at Islington Council because of her stance on same-sex civil partnerships.
She was disciplined when she asked for her religious beliefs about same-sex civil partnerships to be accommodated in the workplace. .
The three other cases heading for Europe involve Nadia Eweida and Shirley Chaplin, two workers who were banned from wearing a cross, and Gary McFarlane, relationship counsellor who was dismissed for refusing to give sex advice to homosexuals.
The commission’s John Wadham said: “Our intervention in these cases would encourage judges to interpret the law more broadly and more clearly to the benefit of people who are religious and those who are not.
“The idea of making reasonable adjustments to accommodate a person’s needs has served disability discrimination law well for decades. It seems reasonable that a similar concept could be adopted to allow someone to manifest their religious beliefs.”
Andrea Minichiello Williams, director of the Christian Legal Centre, which is supporting two of the Strasbourg cases, said: “I do hope that it might be a U-turn but the proof will be that they support the Christian Legal Centre and all these cases.”