Peter & Hazelmary Bull, British Hotel Owners, Fined For Refusing Gay Couple A Room

LONDON — A Christian couple were fined Tuesday for refusing to allow a gay couple the use of a double room at their hotel in southern England, capping a case that has drawn national attention and which the judge himself described as very difficult.

There was a media uproar after Martyn Hall and his partner Steven Preddy were turned away from Chymorvah Private Hotel in Marazion, in southwestern England, in 2008. Husband and wife Peter and Hazelmary Bull – both devout Christians – had refused on religious grounds to let the two men share a room.

In a written judgment handed down at Bristol Country Court, judge Andrew Rutherford ruled that the Bulls' behavior had been illegal and awarded the gay couple 1,800 pounds (about $2,900) each in damages.

Hall and Preddy said they were satisfied with the ruling, noting that they had asked whether they could bring their dog – but that it had never occurred to them to check whether they themselves would be welcome.

The Bulls had argued that their intent was not to discriminate against homosexuals, saying they did not allow unmarried heterosexuals to share a double room either. It was also argued that, because they lived on the ground floor of their hotel, they had a right to have their home life respected.

Rutherford rejected those arguments, saying it was clear that the only reason the gay couple was refused to the room "was because of their sexual orientation." He added that the Bulls' right to have their private and family life respected was "inevitably circumscribed by their decision to use their home in part as a hotel."

The case received wide coverage in the British press, with the Bulls' legal defense was supported by Britain's Christian Institute while Hall and Preddy were backed by the country's Equality and Human Rights Commission. It made a brief appearance in last year's election campaign after senior Tory lawmaker Chris Grayling told an audience at a London think tank that he thought bed and breakfast owners should allowed to exclude who they wanted from their own home – comments that disappointed gay rights campaigners.

Rutherford acknowledged he found the case "very difficult."

"It is clearly, in my view, the case that each side hold perfectly honorable and respectable, albeit wholly contrary, views."

Comments

[bradley7777]

10:06 AM on 01/21/2011

Those Christians are being PERSECUTED for not being able to PERSECUTE gay people!

/snark

[Jasel]

04:25 PM on 01/20/2011

""It is clearly, in my view, the case that each side hold perfectly honorable and respectable, albeit wholly contrary, views.""

What is it about Christian bigotry that is so honorable and respectable exactly?

[capercaper]

03:20 PM on 01/23/2011

Because they don't define it as bigotry.

[CognitoErgoSum]

10:53 PM on 01/19/2011

There is NOTHING devoutly Christian about exclusion. If the Bulls want to discriminate in who patronizes their private business, they should advertize that upfront, and should NOT be described as "devoutly Christian."

After all, in Jesus' parable of the Good Samaritan, the inkeeper accepted the money of the Samaritan who took the Judean to the inn, even though the Samitan was considered borderline pagan (and reviled as such) in that region. So where do the Bulls, as innkeepers, get the right to call themselves "Chistians?"

[Rebeccaann01]

08:47 AM on 01/19/2011

They said they had a policy against letting non married people stay together in a room. Mrs. Bull also said that she wasn't homophobic but the bible says... I love when people add but to a sentence, it completely negates the first part.

They were discriminating against a gay couple because unless they can prove they asked every couple who made a reservation their marital status then they pick and choose when to apply the policy. Besides when a couple says yes, how do they know they are married to each other?????? The bible definitely has something to say about that.

[Tunghoy]

06:40 PM on 01/18/2011

The hotel owners should have known better than to have Basil Fawlty as a role model.

[notyouraveragebear]

02:13 PM on 01/19/2011

Que'?

[CognitoErgoSum]

10:55 PM on 01/19/2011

"Fawlty Towers," starring Monty Python player John Cleese as innkeeper Basil Fawlty. It was a British sitcom.

[SuperRyan]

05:34 PM on 01/18/2011

I'm curious to know if this hotel offers pay-per-view porn.

[Chauncy Freeman]

05:26 PM on 01/18/2011

“When fascism returns it will be carrying a pink swastika wrapped in a rainbow flag.” Larry Sinclaire Upton Lewis
AND IT HAS RETURNED. This time the very same demons who established the “Brown Shirts” in 1930s Germany are back but this time wearing fuchsia boas. If we do not have freedom of conscience nor the freedom of dissent, nor the freedom of association WE HAVE NOT FREEDOM.
When the state forbids and prohibits the freedom to exercise conscience and the right to privacy who will forbid the state from committing crimes against humanity?
Historically it has been the voice of the Christian church and the voices of Christian individuals who stand against totalitarianism, fascism and tyranny. The ruling elite knows this historic fact and are systematically and deliberately targeting soft voices of conscience and publicizing their persecution to make public examples of what happens to conscientious objectors.
Among Hitler’s first official acts as Chancellor was the deliberate targeting and murdering defenseless nuns and priests knowing that they would be his natural enemies and dissenters. He knew that the merciless elimination of pacifist challengers would instill terror into anyone who would object in the future. Make no mistake, the Bull family has been chosen for this very reason. Stripping the individual of their conscience is a bloodless rape and murder of the soul and essential human right to privacy and conscience.
This travesty has NOTHING to do with homosexuality but everything to do with the state defining “official morality”.

[ramal]

06:00 PM on 01/18/2011

You have freedom of conscience, dissent and association, not freedom to discriminate based upon your own moral code when providing a public service or conveniece. Do pick up a history book and learn that long before the Nazis attacked certain members of the Chrisitian clergy and religious orders there were national laws preventing Jews from entering university or certain professions and even eating in most cafes, bars and restaurants. Your histrionics denote a personality well-suited to creative fiction writing.

[coolmaiden]

09:46 AM on 01/21/2011

Yeah, not really. You don't get to open a business to the public and cherry-pick your customers.

[tselby]

04:52 PM on 01/18/2011

Now to end the discrimination at all the businesses with their No Shoes, No Shirt, No Service signs. The shoeless and shirtless community has been oppressed far too long.

[JohnJames]

05:11 PM on 01/18/2011

So you could change from being heterosexual to homosexual as easily as deciding whether to wear a shirt? I doubt you want to say that.

[ramal]

05:53 PM on 01/18/2011

If you can't afford shoes and/or a shirt you probably cannot afford to stay in a hotel or eat out.

[Hank26]

04:15 PM on 01/18/2011

Money usually trumps morals. I guess not for this couple. Now they get to pay the gay couple LOTS of money....to go to nicer B & B's. Justice served. BTW, if this Christian couple had any clue as to what probably goes on in their 'house' by Christian couples, they'd convert to atheism on the spot.

[ramal]

03:29 PM on 01/18/2011

Every victory gonna bring another. If you are discriminated against, stand up for your rights and always hit 'em where it hurts---which is usually the pocketbook.

[stop the politics]

04:00 PM on 01/18/2011

What is interesting is that both groups were discriminated against. The couple wanting a room was discriminated against because they could not get a room because of their sexual orientation and the couple owning the hotel was discriminated against because of their religious beliefs.

[Jason N]

04:00 PM on 01/18/2011

Sorry, the "you're discriminating against my right to discriminate" bs logic was shot down with the civil rights act.

[thinkingwomanmillstone]

04:03 PM on 01/18/2011

owning a business changes their home from private to public. It is exactly the same as discriminating against ethnic or religious minorities.

[LeftRight]

03:02 PM on 01/18/2011

To those who are SOOOOOO concerned about the property rights of the poor couple who were told to take in "the gays"....

I ask you, do your personal property rights grant you the authority to dump nuclear waste into a convenient river beside your power plant? Do your personal property rights grant you the authority to dump carcinogens directly into your town's drinking water? Do your personal property rights grant you the authority to go out and kill striking workers...

[adoantarel]

03:19 PM on 01/18/2011

Actually, the better question might be, do your personal property rights give you the freedom to invite a person into your home and then kill or rob him? Is anything you do on your own property legal? Of course not.

Hence, even if one were to consider such a business as wholly private property (which it isn't; it's a hybrid of private and public), one must admit that it is still subject to laws of the land.

[Ed Baker]

04:10 PM on 01/18/2011

Sorry - it is private property - there is no "hybrid". It's completely private. However, commercial activity is subject to regulation and does not carry the protection of the Bill of Rights. This case was in the UK - where they have state sponsored religion - and the Church of England does not discriminate against gay people anymore.

The Supreme Court of the United States has said you have the right to believe whatever you want - what you do is subject to regulation. The case involved a mormon who told the court he believed he was going to hell for not having more than one wife.... the court said he had every right to believe that - but he didn't have the legal right to have two wives under Utah state law.

[tselby]

04:50 PM on 01/18/2011

You win the dumbest post of the day award. Nothing you said made an sense what so ever. Congrats.

[Aelfgifu]

05:30 PM on 01/18/2011

I think anyone with a modicum of education and the basic mental faculties of at least a three-year-old understood her/his point perfectly.

[LeftRight]

07:23 PM on 01/18/2011

Really? Then I BEG of you to please explain why my post is idiotic, because it makes perfect sense to me. While YOU have personal rights, they end at the end of MY nose!

[ANuttyReader]

03:01 PM on 01/18/2011

The hotel owners should consider a different line of business if they don't want immorals in their home, or change the name of the hotel to the "Holy Hotel - Gays Not Welcome" hotel, pets allowed.

[MiddleRiver]

03:42 PM on 01/18/2011

How do they know that the heterosexual couple that they rented the bedroom next to theirs is not engaging in marital sodomy?

[ANuttyReader]

05:51 PM on 01/18/2011

Because their "moral radar" tells them..

[Freddie27]

02:52 PM on 01/18/2011

Fantastic ruling. While people should be at complete liberty to refuse anyone who comes to their home, once that home is a hotel it becomes a business, and subject to anti-discrimination laws.

[lolawants1117]

02:52 PM on 01/18/2011

What?! Not millions? Silly British courts...

[Forester]

02:47 PM on 01/18/2011

The Bulls stated reason for refusal of service was based on the couple being unmarried, not being gay. The couple were civil partners, and this decision effectively elevates civil unions to marriage status. The couple may well have set up the Bulls to test the courts on this matter. It is humorous that this legal decision was born out of the Bull's personal revulsion towards homosexuality. Certainly an unintended consequence.

[adoantarel]

02:50 PM on 01/18/2011

Given that gays cannot get married in England, shouldn't civil unions definitely be the equal of marriages legally? If not, then civil unions do not enjoy all the legal benefits of marriage, and are not even "seperate but equal." They would be separate and lesser.

[Forester]

02:57 PM on 01/18/2011

I do not have any knowledge of the relative equality of marriage and civil unions under British law, but suspect the couple chose to sue to test the courts on this matter. The decision, if solely based on the marriage status of the couple, would confirm an equivalence, at least in the narrow scope of this case. The question is, how does this decision affect same sex marriage in broader terms.

[Ed Baker]

04:11 PM on 01/18/2011

That's the problem with "separate but equal..."