Evangelical organisations have begun legal action against one of Scotland’s largest charities, accusing it of anti-religious discrimination.
Stirling Free Church and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA), which continues the work of the late American preacher, are suing the Robertson Trust, a poverty relief agency linked to one of the country’s best-known whisky producers.
The groups, which oppose same-sex marriage, claim that contracts to use rooms owned by the trust were cancelled because of objections to their beliefs. The allegations are strongly rejected by the charity, which gives away about £20 million a year. It distributes dividends from its controlling stake in the whisky firm Edrington, which owns the Famous Grouse and Macallan.
The Free Church congregation claims that the trust agreed to allow them to use its Barracks conference centre in Stirling for Sunday worship and the BGEA said that it booked the same venue for a one-off meeting. Both bookings were later cancelled by the charity.
“We made it clear to the venue at the time of booking that we are a Christian organisation,” Roger Chilvers of the BGEA said. “It was only later that they came back and said they were cancelling our booking because of our religion. You can’t have a situation where religious groups are banned from hiring neutral spaces. That is not a free society.” He added: “This is anti-religious discrimination, plain and simple.”
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The Rev Iain Macaskill of Stirling Free Church alleged their “mainstream Christian belief” that marriage should be between a man and woman was behind the cancellation.
“We were shocked to be told we could no longer use the Barracks for our Sunday services,” he said. “We had negotiated with the trust in good faith and their contract expressly refers to us using the premises for religious worship.
“The staff seemed embarrassed when they had to tell us they were terminating our arrangement.”
Both groups will be represented by Aidan O’Neill QC at a hearing which is expected to take place at Glasgow sheriff court next week.
The Robertson Trust insisted that claims that they discriminated against faith groups were “completely unfounded”.
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“The decision to cancel the hire of the Barracks conference centre by the Free Church of Scotland at Stirling and the BGEA was based entirely on our policy which states that we do not fund or support projects and activities which incorporate the promotion of political or religious beliefs,” Gerry McLaughlin, vice-chairman of the board of trustees, said.
“This has been the case for decades. On discovering the breach to our policy, the trustees took immediate action to cancel the booking and reimburse the heavily subsidised charity rates that had been offered in error.
“While we do not fund or support the promotion of any particular religious or political beliefs, the Robertson Trust is proud of its work with faith-based organisations, with whom we work closely to address the issues of poverty and trauma in communities across Scotland.”
In a separate development Kenneth Ferguson, a member of the Free Church, alleges he was removed as chief executive of the trust because of his objection to same-sex weddings.
A tribunal investigating his claims will resume next month.