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A Christian magistrate was forced to resign because he refused to place children for adoption with gay couples, an employment appeal tribunal was told yesterday.

Andrew McClintock, 63, stood down from the family panel in Sheffield after he was refused exemption from adoption hearings involving same-sex couples. He had written to his employers requesting the exemption before the law changed in April to allow same-sex couples to adopt. His request was refused and he resigned.

Mr McClintock lost a claim for discrimination at an employment tribunal in March.

At his appeal against that decision yesterday, Paul Diamond, for Mr McClintock, said that his client believed that he had rational grounds to question whether it was in the child’s best interest to be placed with a gay couple. He said that his client felt that placing a child with a gay couple was an experiment in social science.

“It is possible to argue that a child can thrive in a same-sex household. What is more difficult to argue, however, is that it is anything but experimental,” Mr Diamond said.

Mr Diamond insisted that Mr McClintock’s view was not a deep-seated religious belief, but the “valid and responsible” opinion of a “reasonable scientific officer”. Mr Diamond said: “He simply said, ‘In my view the best interests of a child are best served by a dual-gender upbringing’.

“A sitting judge was put in the position where he was forced to step down. There cannot be a religious barrier to office – people are religious and do carry their views.”

He added: “This is a judge saying, ‘I’ve got a duty - you wouldn’t experiment with medicine on children, show me the evidence’.

“He could have stayed on if he was prepared to sit in a court and say, ‘I don’t know where this child is going and I can’t fulfil my duty’. He had no option but to go or do something which he felt was wrong.”

Adrian Lynch, for the Department for Constitutional Affairs, said that it was for Parliament to decide who could adopt children. Mr Lynch said claims that Mr McClintock had been forced to resign were without foundation.

He said: “It was [Mr McClintock] who made it abundantly clear that he would resign from the family panel if he were not allowed special exemption. The judge’s duty is to apply the law . . . the truth is that Mr McClintock was refusing to apply the law.”

He said the department had given “full consideration” to Mr McClintock’s position, and judges and magistrates could not decide which parts of the law they wished to apply.

Keith Porteous Wood, of the National Secular Society, called for the appeal to be dismissed. He said: “Andrew McClintock is not, as he is claiming, facing discrimination for his Christian beliefs. When he took on his position he undertook to uphold the law without fear or favour.

“He now wants to pick and choose his cases, something other magistrates are not permitted to do. We must not allow the law to be ‘religionised’.”

Mr McClintock, a father of four, has been a magistrate for 18 years and continues to sit on nonfamily cases. The result of the appeal, which is being held in London, will be announced at a later date.

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