Family-run Ashers Baking Company should not be forced to promote a cause which its owners profoundly disagree with, a columnist says. Writing in the Belfast Telegraph, Fionola Meredith said Ashers’ situation was “not a case of anti-gay discrimination” because the row is over a message – not an individual. Meredith explained that she supports same-sex marriage but disagrees with earlier court rulings against the Christian bakers viewing it as an issue of compelled speech rather than gay rights. “No company should be under any obligation to facilitate the dissemination of beliefs that are antithetical to the ethos of that business. . . . The message itself – not the customer requesting it – has always been the issue for Ashers.”

The columnist described the long-running legal case brought by the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland as “costly, vexatious and divisive”. She said it was not equality to force everyone to “disseminate political beliefs that they fundamentally disagree with”.

“It is not tolerance. It is not freedom. If Ashers lose this week, we all lose”.