US evangelist Franklin Graham has won almost £100,000 in damages for religious discrimination after an event in Glasgow in 2020 was cancelled under pressure from LGBT campaigners.
Graham had booked an evangelistic event at the city’s Hydro arena as part of a UK-wide tour. The tour was eventually abandoned because of Covid-19; other venues had also cancelling bookings.
After the venue’s operator (Scottish Event Campus) had become aware of opposition from the LGBT community following the booking, Graham clarified on Facebook that everyone in the LGBTQ community was ‘absolutely welcome’ – but the venue cancelled the event.
Breach of equality laws
However, Glasgow’s Sheriff Court found that the intended audience was the general public, irrespective of any religious belief or of sexuality. It ruled that the venue had failed to prove that its decision to cancel the event was nothing to do with religion or philosophical belief. Therefore, it had breached equality laws.
The sheriff ruled: ‘A party without the religious views and beliefs of the pursuer would not have been subjected to the same treatment … The principle of religious toleration and the preservation of religious pluralism are constitutional principles of law which are reinforceable by the courts in the same way as other legal principles.’
