Sturgeon suffers courtroom blow over church lockdown rules

The Scottish government has suffered a major reversal in court over its Covid-19 regulations. The Court of Session has found its blanket ban on public worship to be unlawful. In January, Nicola Sturgeon closed places of worship across Scotland ‘for all purposes except broadcasting a service or conducting a funeral, wedding, or civil partnership’. She said at the time that, while ministers were ‘well aware of how important communal worship is to people… we believe this restriction is necessary to reduce the risk of transmission’.

Canon Tom White, parish priest of St Alphonsus in Glasgow’s east end, and representatives of other Christian denominations, sought judicial review. They argued that this closure imperilled the independence of the Church, that ministers lacked the power to shut churches in any circumstances, and that the regulations were unlawful and disproportionately interfered with the right to manifest religious belief under article nine of the ECHR.

They accepted there was a legitimate aim in controlling the pandemic but that ministers had not pursued the least restrictive means of doing so.