THE Baillieu government is preparing to restore unlimited rights to religious organisations to discriminate against gays and lesbians, single mothers and people who hold different spiritual beliefs.

Attorney-General Robert Clark is drawing up amendments, to be introduced to Parliament in May or June, to curb Victoria's anti-discrimination laws as part of the Coalition's election promises to conservative religious groups.

The amendments will scrap Labor's reforms, which take effect in August, that give wider investigative powers to the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission and restrict the rights of faith-based organisations to refuse employment and services to people they believe may undermine their beliefs.

Under the Labor reforms, for instance, a religious welfare agency that refuses to serve a same-sex couple must prove how this action conformed to its faith, or a Catholic school that refused to employ a single mother as a receptionist must show why the job was important to following the school's faith.

But this so-called ''inherent requirements'' test would soon be scrapped, Mr Clark said in an interview with The Sunday Age.