Foster parents refused
Lancashire Council has rejected a Christian couple’s application to become foster parents because of their strongly held views on marriage.
Rev. John and Colette Yallop, from Blackburn, told the council that they were Christians and were initially informed this would not prevent them from being foster parents.
However, according to the Christian Legal Centre (CLC), the couple were asked whether they would object to having prospective homosexual adoptive parents come into their house for a ‘handover’.
The couple said that any meetings with prospective homosexual adoptive parents should take place at a children’s centre rather than in their own home, as they were concerned that it may cause confusion to their own two young children, aged 5 and 7.
As a result of this request, their application was terminated by the Council, which the CLC believes discriminates against them because of their beliefs that marriage is between a man and a woman, and children ‘do best when they have a mother and father’.
CLC director Andrea Minichiello Williams said, ‘It is vital that as Christians we are allowed to live out our faith in public and not be eliminated from this kind of vital community work due to oppressive equalities legislation’.
