MONDAY 28 NOVERMBER
2011
Members Present
Lord Richard (Chairman)
Baroness Andrews
Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield
Bishop of Leicester
Lord Norton of Louth
Lord Rooker
Baroness Scott of Needham Market
Lord Trefgarne
Lord Tyler
Baroness Young of Hornsey
Gavin Barwell MP
Mr Tom Clarke MP
Ann Coffey MP
Oliver Heald MP
Mrs Eleanor Laing MP
Dr Daniel Poulter MP
John Stevenson MP
The Archbishop of Canterbury (QQ 428-451)
Examination of Witness
The Most Rev and Rt Hon Rowan Douglas
Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury
Q428 The Chairman:
Archbishop, thank you very much for coming. We are grateful. I
think you know what the Committee is about and the issues that
we are faced with. Would you like to make an opening statement
before we launch the questions at you?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Thank you, Lord Chairman. I am very grateful to the Committee
for this opportunity to make some introductory remarks. The Committee
will have had copies of the submission that the Archbishop of
York and I sent, which expresses the views of the Bishops. The
Committee will know that we welcome the draft Bill as an opportunity
to debate reform of the House of Lords. Our starting point has
been to ask what will best serve Parliament and the nation. In
a bicameral legislature, what kind of second Chamber do we actually
need, which provides a restrained but effective check and balance
to the House of Commons? We agree that some reform of the Lords
is long overdue, not least in solving the problem of an ever increasing
membership and the pressure on seats—we on the Bishops'
Benches have noted that particularly in the last year or so. We
also see a compelling case for retaining a second Chamber distinctive
from the House of Commons in composition and powers. Our view
is that a second Chamber should be composed so as to ensure the
just use of power entrusted to the Government of the day, one
which commands a majority in the House of Commons; so as to ensure
true and impartial accountability, scrutinising and revising government
legislation with a degree of independence not possible in the
House of Commons; and so as to represent the diversity of what
I and others have called non-partisan civil society and intellectual
life.
Our concern is that the nature of the second Chamber
should be shaped by considerations about its purpose—considerations
of that sort. We believe that the proposal in the draft Bill to
have a much smaller second Chamber which is entirely or almost
entirely elected would bring about a fundamental change, producing
a second House which is only doubtfully likely to secure those
objectives. We believe that it is important that all Members of
the second Chamber should have a full understanding of the diversity
of civil society. That is where we believe that the Bishops' contribution
comes in.
Bishops, of course, are not life Peers. They are
Peers of Parliament. They sit in the House until they retire as
diocesan Bishops. They serve only when they are in harness in
the diocese. They bring to bear their experience of all aspects
of civil society in their own diocesan area. It has been said
that they are in effect the only Members of the upper House who
have something like constituencies. I draw the Committee's attention
to the appointments procedure for Bishops—it is not always
widely understood. It involves elected members of our Synod and
extensive consultation with civil society in the vacant diocese.
It approaches and draws opinions from a large number of people
in, for example, civil administration, education and a number
of other community locations. The appointments procedure takes
for granted that a Bishop has a very visible role in civil society.
One of the things that we hear most often in the
Crown Nominations Commission from non-church representatives from
the diocese who have been consulted is that they want someone
who will speak for the city, speak for the county and speak for
the region. That is not just a matter of empty words, as I think
is shown by the number of diocesan Bishops who have served and
continue to serve in regional partnerships, often in the chair.
The rooted presence of the Church of England in every community
of England and the committed membership of nearly 1 million regular
weekly attendees gives Bishops personal access to a very wide
spread of civil organisation and experience—perhaps wider
than is enjoyed by many comparable public figures. Their personal
contribution to the work of the House of Lords therefore draws
not on partisan policy but on that direct experience, as well
as engagement generally with questions of ethics, morality and
faith. Bishops know every church in their diocese. They know the
communities they serve—and they serve far more people than
church attendance in a narrow sense represents. They take part
in civil ceremonies. They visit and are known by hospitals, care
homes, the Armed Forces, factories, prisons, universities and
community projects. In prisons, they have a statutory right of
visitation. Hundreds of primary and secondary schools are Church
of England schools. In other words, diocesan Bishops belong in
a web of relationships in the communities that they serve and
have direct lines of communication into those societies at every
level. As I noted, people look to the Church of England to provide
focus and a voice for the community at times of shared mourning
or celebration.
In many cities, the Church of England acts as the
convener for bringing representatives of different faiths together.
That is also true at the national level where, in only the last
seven days, I have had experience of convening three gatherings
of faith leaders on a national basis. I think that that would
be borne out by analysis of the church's response to last summer's
urban disturbances. All this gives the established church a capacity
to express common values in a way that no other organisation is
placed to do. The Chief Rabbi has said that if the established
church is removed from the public square, common values become
more difficult to articulate. It is also fair to say that some
Members of both Houses of Parliament look to the Bishops to offer
a faith perspective, which they may sometimes hesitate to volunteer
in their own right.
I raise these points not by way of special pleading
for the Bishops in the second Chamber but to point out some of
what might be lost if change is brought about in a simply formulaic
way and if we have not addressed what we want the House of Lords
to do before considering what composition and basis of appointment
best deliver that function. I have not yet touched at length on
the particular constitutional relationships of Bishops to the
Crown in England, or indeed on the status of three of the named
Bishops in the draft Bill as ex officio privy counsellors. That
might need further discussion. In short, I agree that the House
of Lords needs reform. It strikes me personally—this is
a personal rather than a Church of England view—that the
package of measures proposed in Lord Steel's Bill provide a very
effective basis for a revising Chamber. Beyond that, Lord Chairman,
I am happy to invite the Committee's questions.
Q429
The Chairman:
Thank you very much. I start by asking what I hope is not a formulaic
approach. You believe that the House of Lords needs reforming
but you do not accept that it should be an elected or predominantly
elected House. If the House of Lords remains a nominated and unelected
House, would you then agree that the number of Bishops should
be reduced?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I do not think that it would be particularly helpful to have the
proportion of Bishops in the House of Lords increased in any way.
If there is a reduction in the numbers in the upper House, the
Bishops would have to face the implications of that. In an appointed
House, there is a strong case for Bishops retaining their place
on the grounds that I have already outlined as speaking for this
non-partisan civic perspective. I would hope that, in such circumstances,
that case would still be made and accepted.
The Chairman:
Yes, but 26 as opposed to 12?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
That is precisely why, Lord Chairman, I said that we would accept
the need for a proportionate reduction.
The Chairman:
I see. So if the House was to remain as it is and there is no
Bill, you think the Church of England should remain entitled to
26 Bishops but, if the Bill goes through, you would come down
to 12.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
At the moment, Lord Chairman, the 26 Bishops are deployed on a
basis that assumes that none of them is in a position to be a
full-time working Peer. The number 26 allows us the flexibility
to have enough meaningful participation. A reduction in that number
in present circumstances would leave us in a very difficult position
if we wish to participate.
The Chairman:
Just one final point on this before I throw it open: if the Lords
remains as it is and the number of Bishops in the Lords remains
at 26, would you be in favour of other faiths being introduced
into the House of Lords? Could you say a word about what sort
of faiths, how many and which?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Our own submission makes it clear—we have been clear throughout
discussions over the last decade or more—that the Bench
of Bishops has no objection to other faiths being included in
some way. We also recognise the extraordinary practical difficulties—as
you have noted, Lord Chairman—in deciding who should be
represented in that way. There would be a number of possible answers.
The national Inter Faith Network recognises nine major faiths
who are invited as of course to a number of national events. That
might be a basis on which to proceed, but I also note the very
complex issues that have been put before this Committee and others
by, I believe, Professor McLean, on the large proportion of faith
representatives that might be entailed if you assumed that all
those faiths should be represented on something like the same
basis.
Perhaps I may add just one other comment. It is certainly
a good idea for any appointments mechanism to take into consideration
the representation of minority faiths in some way in a second
Chamber. That would not of itself replace the way in which Bishops
are acknowledged to be able to convene local faith leaders and
represent the particular and far from homogeneous mix of faith
communities in different regions of the country. Non-Christian
observers have, I think, made the point quite strongly that those
who belong to minority communities feel that the Bishop is in
a unique position to convene groups of leaders as appropriate
in different parts of the country without going through a mechanical
box-ticking of who has to be represented. There is a sort of flexibility
and local sensitivity there.
Q430
Lord Tyler:
I am not declaring an interest; I am sort of confessing. I am
a practising Anglican in the sense that I am trying to do it better.
I chair the Faiths & Civil Society Unit at Goldsmiths College.
Naturally, I have listened with great interest. There are two
questions I would ask as an Anglican. Do you think from your experience
in Wales that the Welsh nation felt deprived that they were not
represented in the House of Lords? Was the Welsh church in any
way weaker in the community in Wales because it was not represented
in the House of Lords?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I wondered whether I would get a question on the Welsh dimension—the
equivalent of the West Lothian question, I suppose. Of course,
for nearly the last century, the Church in Wales has had a very
different history from that of the Church of England. The rationale
of disestablishment nearly a century ago was that Anglicanism
in Wales was very much a minority. Since then, I think that the
Anglican Church in Wales has had to work out a way of relating
to civil society in Wales on a rather different basis from the
Church of England. It did not, day to day, feel all that different,
but there were those in the Church in Wales who would have said
quite strongly, "Take away the relationship with the state
in Westminster and things will also change in Wales". In
other words, I do not think that you alter the Welsh situation
for the better if there is any question of removing Bishops in
England. When the Wakeham commission was doing its work, there
was quite a lot of discussion in Wales about whether there should
be some sort of representation for the Welsh Christian communities.
There was a fairly widespread consensus among those who discussed
it in Wales that, were the Archbishop of the Anglican Church in
Wales to be invited to sit in an upper Chamber, it would be very
welcome.
Q431 Lord Tyler:
That seems to lead to some real questions about the link between
representation in Parliament and establishment. Am I not right
in thinking that the role of the Lords spiritual—who I gather
from one of your colleagues at one point actually had a majority
in this House because they included medieval abbots and abbesses—predates
the Reformation, the established church and Henry VIII? Is this
not really now an anomaly that needs addressing, not least for
the people of Wales—or indeed Scotland and Northern Ireland?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
It really depends where you start from. If the question is whether
religious bodies in Northern Ireland, Wales or Scotland properly
require some kind of voice in Westminster as religious bodies,
I have already said that I do not think that that is much helped
by removing the Lords spiritual. The second point, of course,
is that the Lords spiritual are part of a constitutional settlement.
They have a relationship to the Crown, which other church leaders—including
the Anglican Church leaders of the other nations—do not.
That is part of the background of their being there and part of
the set of considerations which affects their appointment—the
processes that I have already mentioned in which the public interest,
in the widest sense, is very directly involved. I think that there
will also be the quite simple question of, anomaly or not, what
precisely is the problem that is solved by the removal of the
Lords spiritual?
Lord Tyler:
Well, it may be that others would say that they would rather like
to come in under an appointments system. The established Church
of Scotland might say that, if there is merit in the link between
representation in the legislature and establishment, here is another
curious anomaly.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
The establishment of the Church of Scotland is, of course, a very
different thing from the establishment of the Church of England.
It does not involve the monarch in any way in the appointment
of the Church of Scotland's leadership, to take the obvious example.
Lord Tyler:
From an Anglican point of view, that might be a great benefit
to the Church of England, I would think, but I had better not
go down that route.
Q432
The Chairman:
I do not think that you had. I agree with that. Can I just follow
this up with one little question? If the offer, so to speak, on
the table was that the Church in Wales and the Church of Scotland
came in and there was a reduction in the number of Bishops from
the Church of England—this is not the Church of England
Bishops being all thrown out—to make room for the other
churches, would that be acceptable?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I certainly do not think that it is a zero-sum game that we are
talking about here, but I would need to see any such proposals
on the table before commenting in detail and I would want to hear
the views of my colleagues in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
My sense is that there is not, at the moment, a great deal of
pressure from the churches there on this subject, but that is
just an anecdotal impression.
The Chairman:
Perhaps they should try the Assembly in Cardiff.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
There is a long story there, Lord Chairman.
Q433
Baroness Scott of Needham
Market: I was very taken
with your opening remark about a voice for the region. I found
it rather intriguing, because whether or not an area, a town,
a city or a region feels that it has a voice is entirely dependent
on whether it happens to have a Bishop at that time. I just wonder
if that does not actually make the case for having some sort of
geographic link for the whole country, so that everyone can feel
that they have a voice in this half of Parliament.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Let me repeat that I would not at all object to that as a proposal
if I could see it fleshed out. The only point that I wish to put
on the table at this juncture is that, as I say, it is not a zero-sum
game that we are talking about. The virtues of the presence of
Bishops as regional voices would not exactly be augmented if they
were removed simply because there were no voices from the three
other nations.
Q434
Baroness Scott of Needham
Market: I have a second
question. In the current House there is a wide range of attendance
and activity levels, from people who are here virtually every
day to others. I think that it would be fair to say that currently
the Bishops are at the lower end in terms of that activity level.
I wonder two things. First, do you have internal rules and processes
for discussing how active you think the Member should be? Secondly,
do you think that an issue may emerge when we have a House that
is, if you like, more professional—one that is salaried
and where the whole atmosphere is different?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Thank you. Yes, those are two very important questions, if I may
say so, so let me take both of them. On the first question, the
answer is yes. We have internal systems and, of course, the basic
rota for the Bishop who takes Prayers and who is in attendance
for a fixed period. That is fixed year by year. We also have meetings
of the Lords spiritual from time to time at our House of Bishops
meetings. We will discuss what particular pieces of legislation
are coming up and who is prepared to attend, to be briefed and
to take part in those. We also assume—again, this is in
your papers—that it is quite likely that Bishops will be
asked to serve from time to time on Select Committees and so forth,
as indeed they have and they do. So we have some system about
this. However, and this really goes back to the 26 question, were
the House of Lords to change its character—to be smaller
or to be more a matter of, as you say, professional politicians—we
would have to face the question, which is noted in the submission
from the Archbishop of York and me, of how we best facilitated
the participation of a smaller number of Bishops in a more demanding
regime, as you might say, of attendance and so forth. So we have
begun already to look at those questions and to ask how we could
reorganise our representation and what the extra demands on those
Bishops still present in the second Chamber would be, which we
would have to supply and resource as a church. These are very
live questions for us and I understand exactly why they are being
asked.
Q435
Baroness Young of Hornsey:
I have two questions. The purpose of the proposed election is
to have democratic legitimacy. If someone says, in relation to
the appointment of the Bishops, that the Bishops come from a relatively
narrow spectrum of society and that they have separate rules of
appointment, separate discipline and no women, does not all that
undermine the notion of legitimation either through democratic
election or through a rigorous independent appointments procedure?
That is the first question. You were talking earlier about the
qualities of Bishops, saying that they represent aspects of civil
society and have that connection, so the second question is whether
you could say why you do not think that it would be okay for them
simply to go forward and apply to be one of the 20 per cent appointed
Peers, were we to have that particular system, as opposed to having
this closed group with a guaranteed position.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Thank you. On the accountability question first, I have explained
that we have a nomination procedure in the Church of England that
attempts to canvass as widely as possible in local communities
what the perceived needs are to which a Bishop's presence would
be material. We take strongly into consideration in that process
the likelihood or, in some cases of course, with the senior Bishops,
the certainty of a Bishop having to operate within the House of
Lords. So within the system of appointment, we have, I believe,
some elements of public accountability built in, in the way that
we do that particular bit of business. Certainly it leaves the
Bishops in a distinctive category in a reconstructed House. The
question is whether—this leads us on to your second issue—the
guaranteed presence of a particular kind of faith-based voice
in the second Chamber is significant. The Bishops are there as
Lords spiritual. They are not there—and this may sound a
little counterintuitive—to represent the Church of England's
interests. They are there as Bishops of the realm, to use a rather
old-fashioned phrase, who have historically—certainly in
the past couple of decades—more and more taken on the role
of brokering and attempting to speak for the needs of the wide
variety of faith communities. I think that if you look at some
of the debates in which Bishops have been involved—around
education and around the Racial and Religious Hatred Bill, for
example—you will see that in operation. That is one reason
why I think that the Bishops would be reluctant to cede the pass
on their particular role as being involved in religious representation
in the broadest possible sense and would not wish to be subsumed
in the general appointment procedure. You noted also, I think
quite reasonably, the somewhat restricted pool from which Bishops
are currently drawn—men. You will notice in our submission
that we have taken this on board to the extent of suggesting that
Clause 28(4) in the draft Bill should drop, to allow the church
the flexibility, when women are allowed to be ordained Bishops,
to fast-track, so to speak, the first women in that position on
to the Bishops' Benches.
Q436
Baroness Symons of
Vernham Dean: I do not
know whether we are to declare an interest, but I am an active
member of the Church of England. Archbishop, you said a moment
or two ago that you thought that the Bishops were able to speak
for a wide variety of faith members. Would it not be better if
those faith members were able to have a place themselves to speak
for themselves? You put it rather elliptically when the Lord Chairman
asked about other faiths, because you said that you had "no
objection" to other faiths. I wondered why you could not
be a little bit warmer and why you might not welcome the participation
of other faiths in the House.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I am very happy to be as warm as you like. We would welcome that
and we do welcome it, because of course there are members of other
faith communities already in the second Chamber. If I may go back
to the substantive point, yes, of course it is important that
we as Bishops do not assume that we have the right to speak for
other faith communities—that would be very insulting, I
think, to other communities—but I think that most Bishops
would agree that this is a role into which we have been increasingly,
and willingly, shunted by the facts of social and religious life
in a variety of localities. The difficulties that I flagged a
moment ago are very real ones. People sometimes assume that all
faith communities must be pretty much of the same shape and that
there must therefore be equivalent national leaders for Muslim,
Hindu or Jewish communities. This is by no means the case. It
is extremely difficult, I think, to decide how you would set about
finding anything like comparable representation. It may therefore
be that, for the moment, until we think of some better scheme,
the Bishops faute de mieux act as spokesmen because they act as
conveners, to use my earlier word, in the localities.
Q437
Baroness Symons of
Vernham Dean: A lot
of people would argue that it is an anomalous position that we
have so many Bishops in the House at the moment and no one appointed
from other faiths to represent those faiths, although I hear what
you say about the difficulties in doing that. To take Lady Young's
point, does not the position of the Bishops become even more anomalous
if the House becomes very largely elected and the Bishops sit
alone as the non-elected dimension? That would seem to compound
what many people already see as a bizarrely anomalous position
that the Bishops have in the 21st century.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
The anomaly is very real, I grant you, but the question is whether
the removal of the Bishops would be for the benefit or health
of either the upper House or the nation at large. The argument
that I have been trying to put is that it would not.
Q438
Baroness Symons of
Vernham Dean: Can I
then put to you a broader point? It comes at the beginning of
your paper, in paragraph 12, where you say: "In summary,
if, as we believe, the second chamber should remain essentially
a revising chamber and if, as we also believe, the primacy of
the House of Commons is to be maintained, the argument that such
a chamber can only be effective and have proper legitimacy if
it is wholly or mainly elected is no more than an assertion."
I do not want to put words in your mouth, but you appear to be
saying here that you either have elections or you maintain House
of Commons primacy. Is that what you saying, as appears to be
the point? If it is, can you see any way round it, where you could
have elections and still maintain the primacy of the House of
Commons by anything other than what I think we are all agreed
is the rather silly assertion in Clause 2 of the Bill?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
You are quite right to pick up that that paragraph as key to the
feelings that are quite widely shared among the Bishops. I noted
it earlier on partly because I want to make it clear that our
questions about the reform of the upper Chamber are not simply
a matter of episcopal self-interest. We have a genuine concern
about the assumption that the only form of democratic legitimacy
is the electoral pattern of the House of Commons or even STV.
It is a broad question that we are anxious about. Is there another
way forward? We can argue, again, about the proportions between
election and appointment in a second Chamber. We can argue about
the relation between an Appointments Commission and the elected
Members of the first Chamber. I am thinking off the top of my
head here, but we could also argue about the basis or, if you
like, the chemistry of the electoral process. Are we talking about
a simple party process in the second Chamber or are we talking
about something different? Are we talking about a broad extension
of the practices that have grown up around people's Peers and
so forth? There would be a number of ways in which we could come
at this. The protest that is registered in the paragraph that
you quoted was simply against the assumption that democratic legitimacy
equals the electoral system as it works in the House of Commons,
or something rather like it, on a party basis.
Q439 Mrs Laing:
I was going to put Lady Symons's point the other way round. I
had also identified that paragraph 12 of your submission is extremely
important. If we are declaring
interests, Lord Chairman, I do not have an interest to declare,
because I am a member of the Church of Scotland, so that is different.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
So I believe.
Mrs Laing:
I will not take you down that path, because that area of the argument
has already been explored. In the short time that you are with
us, I think that it is far more important to l serious fallacy
given the unusual nature of our constitution ook at what is said
in paragraph 12: "the argument that such a chamber can only
be effective and have proper legitimacy if it is wholly or mainly
elected is no more than an assertion." It happens that, personally,
I agree with your paper on that point, but I wonder whether you
would care to expand on that in the light of paragraph 8, where
you say: "The sheer diversity of constitutional arrangements
across the democratic world should … in our view, instil
a sense of humility in relation to claims that any one approach
is manifestly superior to another." Reading those two paragraphs
together, I wonder whether you would care to expand on that. Can
there be legitimacy without a simple, straightforward party-political
election?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Thank you. Yes, I would be glad to. The word "legitimacy"
is key here, of course; it is a very complex and important word.
The argument, I think, rests on two basic points. One is the broad
theoretical question about the nature of democratic legitimacy
and it works in precisely the way that you have cited in terms
of the huge variety of practice across the globe. If we say that
legitimacy is always necessarily based on direct popular election,
a great many legislatures across the world would be under the
cosh on that, I think. The second, more practical, point is really
to do with a legacy of the Parliament Act and various other things.
An elected second Chamber, we believe, runs the risk—this
needs to be faced down—of being in competition with the
first Chamber in terms of legitimacy, especially if the second
Chamber is elected by a method, the single transferable vote,
that in the eyes of a good many people, including some prominent
people in certain political parties, is regarded as a more legitimate
and more credible method of election than the first past the post
method. So it is a theoretical question as well as a practical
one: does this threaten to upset the balance that the Parliament
Act has enshrined in our constitutional arrangements?
Q440
Lord Trefgarne:
Like several around this table, I claim to be a practising Anglican,
although I was in fact confirmed into the Congregational Church
and come from a family of Congregationalists. You, of course,
were once the Archbishop of Wales and I wonder whether you are
really sue, as you said earlier, that the non-conformist church
in Wales would perhaps not be particularly enthusiastic about
becoming part of the new second Chamber and whether we should
look into that more closely.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I am sure that it is worth looking into. I am simply reporting
the kind of discussion that was around some 12 to 15 years ago,
when this was a live issue in Wales. The rather dramatic change
in the religious demography of Wales since 1920 means that the
Anglican Church in Wales is now considerably larger than the non-conformist
churches, which were once superior in numbers and public influence.
Lord Trefgarne:
Is that truly the case? I did not realise that.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Yes. It was one factor that I think shaped that discussion in
the 1990s, which, as I say, came to the view that, if there were
to be a religious representative from Wales, the person to look
to realistically would be the Anglican Archbishop. You are quite
welcome to write that off as anecdotal, once again, but it is
certainly worth looking into and that will be the background to
it.
Q441 Lord
Trefgarne: May I also
ask you a slightly different question? What do you think is the
view of the non-Christians, not only in Wales but elsewhere, about
joining the second Chamber?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
You have, I think, submissions from the Muslim Council of Britain
and from the Chief Rabbi on this subject. I think that you would
see there some fairly strong evidence that the leadership in those
communities—again, faute de mieux, to go back to Baroness
Symons's question—would say, "Well, we are more confident
that the Bishops can represent us as a group than some of our
own people." That is not to say that there is any lack of
enthusiasm in, let us say, Muslim, Hindu or Jewish communities
for representation of some sort in the House of Lords and, as
I have said, there are already distinguished representatives—or
members, I should say—of those faiths in the House of Lords,
who may regard their role as in some sense to carry the flag for
their communities in certain circumstances. But when opinion is
rounded up on this, it seems to be the view, partly on the basis
of what I keep coming back to, which is the local experience of
the Bishop as convener of faith communities, that these are figures
who are trusted to speak for others.
If I may, Lord Chairman, I will add a brief point
to that, which is not wholly immaterial to either of the questions
that have been raised. Last week I was privileged to have a long-ish,
quite demanding and interesting meeting with a number of very
senior pastors in black majority churches, mostly in the London
area, whose view was almost embarrassingly emphatic that they
trusted the Bishop in the House of Lords to speak for them as
well as for others. Given that that is a very significant part
of not only the Christian population but the population at large
in this country, that is not wholly immaterial to what we are
discussing.
Lord Trefgarne:
They are largely what I would describe as evangelical churches,
presumably.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Yes, these are churches of largely Caribbean or west African membership
with indigenous leadership. They are developing rapidly in numbers
and they are developing also their professional outreach in society.
We are not talking here about the marginal fringe; there are some
very disturbing religious groups around. These are what I would
regard as uncontroversially the mainstream among the black majority
churches, heavily involved in, for example, combating gun crime
in communities, amnesties, mentoring schemes and any number of
other things. They are rapidly, if you will excuse the vulgarism,
upping their game in terms of educating their own pastors and
their own staff. This meeting, which was not specifically on this
subject and rather surprised me in its outcome, ended with a number
of these leaders getting into a corner and saying, "Is there
somebody we should write to to say that we are in favour of Bishops
in the House of Lords?" I pass that on for what it is worth.
Q442
Baroness Andrews:
Could I follow that up very briefly, Archbishop? That is presumably
what you were thinking of, among other things, when you said that
many leaders of other faith communities value the fact that we
have an established church with a role in Parliament. Am I right
in assuming that there is not a pressure that you are aware of
for separate representation?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I think that that is absolutely right. I am certainly not aware
of such pressure. I am not aware either at the moment—and
this is an interesting shift in my lifetime and the lifetime of
most people around the table—of any great pressure for disestablishment
from any Christian body, because I think that most non-Anglican
Christian bodies in the United Kingdom would now see disestablishment
as part of an aggressively secularising programme that they would
want to resist. Whatever the historic unease there may have been
about the privileges of Anglicans in Parliament, that landscape
has now changed, I think, irreversibly.
Q443
Baroness Andrews:
May I follow that up very quickly? You say in paragraph 48: "The
established status of the Church would not be at an end …
but its character would be significantly changed and weakened".
I wonder whether you could expand on that.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Thank you. One of the things that people find very difficult about
the established character of the Church of England is that it
means a very large number of things. There is no one little thing
that you can change or remove in order to disestablish the church.
The experience of the Welsh church suggests that it is like pulling
a loose thread on a badly made cardigan and finding that you are
left with a ball of wool—a lot unravels. That being said,
for the Bishops not to be part of the scrutiny and discernment
that go on around legislation in this country would be, at the
very least, to send a signal that the voice of faith in the general
sense was not particularly welcomed in that process. Nobody is
looking for a theocracy; nobody wants to turn the United Kingdom
into Iran. But there is a strong belief that, particularly in
the geopolitical context in which we live at the moment, the role
of faith in asking questions and in joining in that scrutiny is
very significant. For that to be edged away from the legislative
process would certainly not be tantamount to disestablishment
but it would make the establishment a great deal more hollow than
it is in many ways, because it would alter the sense that British
constitutional history has left us with that this is a society
and political culture in which the voice of faith is neither dominant
nor ignored, which, I think, is a very good place to be—although
I would say that, wouldn't I?
Q444 Dr Poulter:
I have two questions for you, Archbishop. First, on first principles,
it is the presumption of the Bill but also commonly held that
it is very difficult to argue for the hereditary principle in
the House of Lords. This point has been touched on before, that
if we are saying that the hereditary principle is wrong, then
it is also an anachronism that we have Bishops in the House of
Lords by right. What do you think?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I am afraid that I think that that is a false analogy. A hereditary
Peer is present in Parliament on the basis of heredity. An Anglican
Bishop is present in the House of Lords because of a process of
appointment, scrutiny and public responsibility that is clearly
defined. I do not think that the two are equivalent. I am afraid
that anachronism is, to me, a shortcut in an argument.
Q445 Dr Poulter:
Well, I disagree with you and think that others here and probably
a lot of the general public would disagree as well. On the second
point, you make the case that at the moment you have a rota system
for how Bishops participate in the House of Lords and that they
represent a wide geographical spread. If there is to be a cull
of Bishops from 26 to eight, is that not—
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Sorry. Where does the number eight come from?
Dr Poulter:
Sorry, from 26 down to a smaller number, as in the model in the
Bill.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I think the number mentioned is 12.
Dr Poulter:
Indeed, 12. Will it not be the case that it will be much harder
for that rota system to work? You may well end up having faith-based
politicians representing the church here. You may also end up
with that wide geographical spread—one of the presumptions
of your early case—being lost.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
The five named Lords spiritual in the draft Bill already provide
a certain level of general coverage. I do not think it would be
completely lost even if it were just those five—that is,
Durham, Winchester, London, York and Canterbury. As I indicated
earlier, we are looking actively at how we might meet some of
these considerations. For example, if we were looking to nominate
another seven Lords spiritual, we would deliberately set out to
identify particular sees in particular parts of the country, which
would be assumed to be those associated with the Lords spiritual.
We would want to keep that geographical concern very much at the
forefront of our minds because it is an important element in what
the Lords spiritual have offered.
Dr Poulter:
On the second point, about the fact that those seven that would
remain would actually have to spend a disproportionately large
amount of their time in the House of Lords, they would effectively
become much more political in their role here, rather than necessarily
dealing with their previous role in the church—the role
that they have at the moment.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
It is already taken for granted that the work of the House of
Lords is part of what we take into consideration when we nominate
somebody as a Bishop. As I said earlier, these questions are very
carefully and explicitly raised in the nominations and appointments
process. We are not talking about a change of category. As I said
in response to an earlier question, we would have to think very
carefully about what sort of resourcing would be appropriate with
a smaller number to allow our Members to spend longer in the work
of the Chamber. I do not think that it is a question of their
becoming more political; it is a question of their having to act
more like professional politicians in the sense of giving the
time.
Dr Poulter:
Is that not a case of QED, or quod erat demonstrandum?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Yes, I know what it means.
Dr Poulter:
In that case they are being more political as professional politicians.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I assume that becoming "political" means becoming partisan
in some sense, which I do not accept. Becoming professional participants—
Dr Poulter:
Or professional politicians. The whole presumption in what you
put across is that they carry independence and a link to groups
of people whom they represent. But becoming professional politicians,
as you just said, goes against your earlier argument.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I clearly should not use the term "professional politicians".
I am trying to find a way of talking about an increased level
of commitment or professionalism among those who already, I think
it would be agreed, have a fairly high level of commitment and
professionalism in their work in the Chamber. The record is there
to be examined. What we have to consider in different circumstances
is, as I say, how we resource a smaller number to keep up that
level of professionalism in their engagement in the work of the
Chamber.
Q446 Mr Clarke:
Lord Chairman, the Archbishop has already answered the question
that I was going to put, on Clause 28(4). I wonder if he might
want to add to what he already said.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
We are very conscious that one of the reproaches that can be laid
against the Bench at present is that it is not exactly representative
in gender terms. We are in the middle—well, not in the middle,
but near the end—of a complex, protracted process about
the ordination of women as Bishops, which will come to term, we
hope and trust, next summer. As and when women become Bishops,
we do not particularly want women Bishops to have to wait until
2025 or something before there is any possibility of their being
represented on the Bench. Therefore, we want the discretion and
flexibility to allow a little fast-tracking there.
Q447 Ann Coffey:
I just wanted to pursue this troublesome business of elections
a little more. Civic society is very diverse. It certainly is
in my work as a constituency MP. On a regular basis, I meet friends
of parks groups, friends of school groups, residents associations
and community associations. It
is, of course, right that the various churches are involved in
that, but I would say that the overwhelming majority of people
who take part in civic society are not practising Christians—or
indeed practising of any faith at all. Part
of the way in which they choose how they are represented and how
their views are represented is through the whole process of elections,
even though they may get it wrong. In a sense, you kind of side-stepped
this by saying that your case for the Church of England being
represented in the House of Lords is that it is good for society,
even though that is not tested out through any electoral process.
In a sense, you can only hold that opinion if the House of Lords
is not elected. You can have the opinion that it is good for the
Bishops, experts and others to be in the House of Lords because
the House of Lords is about what is good for people, rather than
the population electing people there. That is quite a driver for
the Church of England holding the position that the House of Lords
should not be elected. The second question that I want to ask
relates to your saying earlier that you could not see what problem
would be fixed by not having the Bishops in the House of Lords.
Maybe the problem that would be fixed is that people would perceive
it not as a place that is part of the establishment and the elite
of this country, but a place in which civic society has chosen
whom they send to it to represent their interests.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Perhaps I may take the second point first, on a place where civic
society feels that they have chosen who represents them. I remain
unconvinced that the only method of civic society doing that is
by a partisan electoral process. If you are not going to have
a partisan electoral process, there remains to me a question of
whether the best method of approaching a second Chamber is a properly
accountable Appointments Commission, with some relationship to
other, democratically elected bodies. There are many ways of cutting
that cake. I can understand on your first point why you might
think that our sudden enthusiasm for an appointed second Chamber
is the result of panic about the electoral principle. I really
think that it is rather the other way. We are genuinely concerned,
as Bishops, about the principle of an elected second Chamber and
genuinely believe, as I have argued with a number of people in
this Palace, that there is an issue of a kind that I have mentioned
around the Parliament Act, which has to be faced in some way in
this whole process. The question of whether unelected Bishops
remain an intolerable anomaly in an otherwise wholly elected second
Chamber is one that I find quite difficult to answer because I
accept that it is an anomaly. It is of course an anomaly if you
allow ministerial appointments in a second Chamber. There is any
number of anomalies that we tolerate because we believe that they
are constitutionally on the whole good for us.
Ann Coffey:
Good for people.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Good for people. I hear the reproach of paternalism coming through,
yet if proper accountability is built in and we are not simply
talking about a wholly unaccountable, self-appointed Appointments
Commission, we are in some way plugging it into what people believe
they need. Therefore, I think that an appointed House is democratically
justifiable. Within that, the rather peculiar and distinctive
modes of appointment of Bishops fit in. With the elected House,
of course it is anomalous, but it is not a unique anomaly. I think
it is just about a bearable anomaly because, on balance, I think
it is a constructive one.
Q448 Lord Hennessy of
Nympsfield: I have an
interest to declare. I am a Catholic but with an affection for
the Anglican Church that almost amounts to fellow travelling.
Archbishop Rowan, Gladstone once said that he was in favour of
the established church carrying on because he "clung to the
notion of a conscience … in the State". Do you think
that that idea still has some vitality?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Yes, in a word—not the sole voice of the conscience of the
state but a significant one. Again, it is a reminder of our constitutional
settlement, which assumes that the voice of faith has a role,
as I said earlier, in the discernment around legislation and scrutiny
of proposed legislation. I think that it is important to have
voices, among which the religious voice is extremely significant,
that are not determined by particular sorts of party politics.
Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield:
I agree with you that disestablishment is not exactly a runner
at the moment. Mark Harper, the Minister, when he gave evidence,
said that they were not considering it, which I am sure was a
great relief to you. But if you were disestablished, this argument
of Gladstone's and yours would fall just like that, wouldn't it?
If you were not established, you could not sustain that argument.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
The church would continue to be the church, I believe. It would
engage in other ways. I said that the Anglican Church in Wales
had to find other ways of earning its place at the table, so to
speak, in public discussion. I think that it did that over the
near century of its existence. But I do not see any compelling
reason why the Church of England should have to go through the
same process.
Q449
Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield:
Could you argue that your independence and your relationship to
the people and the constituency who produce your Bishops through
your consultation processes were enhanced when there was a little
bit of the unravelling of the wool of establishment when Mr Brown
decided that he would not interfere in the choice of Bishops by
the church and that he would just act as a postman to Her Majesty
the Queen? David Cameron has done the same. Does that not put
you in a slightly stronger position, or is that the beginning
of the wool unravelling?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I do not think that it is the wool unravelling at all. I think
that what we have is, if you like, a rationalisation of a position
agreed several decades ago, in effect, which was that the Prime
Minister would not interfere in the process of nomination. There
would be a moment of choice, but it has not been exercised for
a very long time.
Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield:
Tony Blair interfered once or twice, didn't he?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
The proceedings of the Crown Nominations Commission are wholly
confidential and I do not know the answer.
Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield:
You know as well as I do, but that is another question.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I genuinely do not know.
Q450 Gavin Barwell:
Archbishop, thank you very much for your joint submission, which,
along with the answers that you have given, make very clear your
views on what the Government are proposing. I
just want to press you a little bit about what you collectively
feel would be the right kind of reform, because the paper recognises
that there is a case for some change. Perhaps you would just humour
me for a minute or two. In paragraph 4, you say: "For
so long as the majority of the House of Lords consisted of the
hereditary peerage there was manifestly a compelling case for
reform." Then you
go on in paragraph 16 to say: "It
seems to us that reforms which bring the second chamber further
under the control of the main political parties … will …
damage the independence of the House of Lords". I
think that it is unarguable that the change that happened in the
late 1990s did that, because there was clearly a move from having
hereditary Peers to a second Chamber of which a large chunk was
appointed by the leaders of the political parties. Indeed, there
are several other references in here, most notably in paragraph
2, where you note the fact that there will not be a ban on MPs
becoming Members of the second Chamber. That implies to me that
your view is that a preferable second Chamber would be one in
which there were far fewer ex-politicians present. Will you elucidate
that? There are several other references that I could quote that
imply that without saying it bluntly.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
Yes, the answer is that I would not be averse to a second Chamber
with fewer ex-party politicians or continuing party politicians.
I have already indicated, I think, that there would be ways of
constructing an Appointments Commission that would develop in
some ways the people's Peers model. There are a number of ways
forward there. For the moment, given that an absolutely global
reform of that kind is not envisaged, we have, as I say, some
sympathy with Lord Steel's proposals.
Q451 Oliver Heald:
Somewhat oddly in the draft Bill, there is a provision that says
that Members of the House of Lords would not be able to stand
for the Commons for four years except for Lords spiritual. There
are two other exemptions
that I will mention to you. In terms of punishment, there is going
to be provision for expulsion and suspension of Lords in certain
circumstances except for the Lords spiritual. When it comes to
non-domiciled, offshore tax people, they are all going to be deemed
to be domiciled in the United Kingdom in order to deal with that
problem except for the Lords spiritual. I just wondered if you
had any idea why that was.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
The implication is quite correct that the number of Lords spiritual
who are building up vast tax fortunes in the Cayman Islands is
quite small—it may even be vanishingly small. I think that
you would have to ask the drafters of the Bill to explain the
rationale here. The church has not sought any of these exemptions,
I should say, and would be perfectly happen to see them fall.
I think that the assumption as regards disciplinary action and
expulsion was that the internal disciplinary regulations of the
Church of England are arguably more severe than those at work
in the parliamentary framework, but any appearance of looking
for special treatment is certainly something that we are not interested
in.
Oliver Heald:
And any suggestion that the reason why you all might want to stand
for the House of Commons is that you are being reduced in number
in the Lords can be firmly denied, can it?
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
I think that that is wildly unlikely, I have to say.
The Chairman:
Archbishop, I thank you very much indeed on behalf of the Committee
for giving us your time and for answering such questions that
we had in such an open and thorough way. Thank you very much indeed.
The Archbishop of Canterbury:
My thanks to you, Lord Chairman, and the Committee.
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