Liberty, the human rights organization, has today released the findings from a poll of United Kingdom Christians on the subject of freedom of religion and religious discrimination.
The poll was commissioned against the background of the case of Nadia Eweida who was banned by her employer, British Airways, from wearing a Christian cross outside her uniform. The case has now reached the Court of Appeal.
A total of 535 Christians aged 18 and over, drawn from the Cpanel, were surveyed by ComRes by online questionnaire between 3 December 2009 and 10 January 2010.
96 per cent of the sample agreed that everybody should have freedom of thought, conscience and religion as long as they do no harm to other people.
85 per cent agreed that, irrespective of their religion, the law should protect the right of believers to wear symbols of their faith.
87 per cent expressed the view that British Airways had acted unfairly towards Nadia Eweida and 86 per cent said that the company was wrong to insist the cross was covered up.
80 per cent thought the case set a dangerous precedent for religious discrimination.
Full computer tabulations of the results of the poll may be found at:
http://www.comres.co.uk/resources/7/Political%20Polls/Liberty%20Cpanel%20tables%20Jan2010.pdf
An article about the case by Shami Chakrabarti, Director of Liberty, appears in today’s issue of The Times (‘Freedom must apply to all faiths and none’). This, with an associated videocast, is also published online at:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article6992931.ece
