Adoption agency wins fight to retain charity status

Britain's last remaining Catholic adoption agency has won an appeal against a decision to strip it of its charitable status.

St Margaret’s Children and Family Care Society in Glasgow had been told last year by the Office of the Scottish Charity regulator (OSCR) that it was breaking the 2010 Equality Act by prioritising married heterosexual couples, following a complaint by the National Secular Society.

However, the Scottish Charity Appeals Panel last week unanimously decided in favour of the adoption agency, overturning the OSCR ruling. The victory means St Margaret’s can continue to describe itself as a Catholic charity. This is in contrast to Catholic adoption agencies in England, who decided to either sever their links with the Church or cease providing adoption services.

Legal experts said St Margaret’s had benefited from emphasising a preference for couples seeking to be adoptive parents to be married (for two years) in line with church teaching. This meant that in theory couples in civil partnerships could adopt, though none had come forward to the agency.

In contrast, Catholic Care in Leeds tried to amend its constitution to state that it “shall only provide adoption services to heterosexuals” following equality legislation. The charity fought an unsuccessful legal battle to continue to place children only with heterosexual couples.

Neil Addison, a Catholic barrister who writes on the Religion Law website, said the English agencies had pursued “the wrong legal route” by ruling out non-heterosexual couples for adoption. St Margaret’s Charitable Objects state that it is “established to promote (irrespective of creed) the welfare of children … to foster the stability of family relationships and to assess the suitability of applicants as adoptive parents, all in accordance with the teachings of the Catholic Church.”