Vacancies in Suffragan Sees and Other Ecclesiastical Offices Measure

My Lords, it is unusual to have the opportunity to speak on a proposed amendment to a law of 1534. It is therefore irresistible and I am sorry that the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, has disappointed me. I recall last July speaking from these Benches on a proposal which had passed through both Houses in 1873 to move the Law Lords across the road. The Conservatives had it reversed, the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, from the Conservative Benches suggesting that was a little too early to move. I had rather hoped the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, would say perhaps it is a little too early to amend this Measure. However, the clear consensus in the Ecclesiastical Committee was of course that we should accept it. I do however want to mention the controversy which we had in the Ecclesiastical Committee about the question of the Crown prerogative and ecclesiastical appointments. I remember as a boy meeting a number of ecclesiastics who had been appointed by the Labour Government in the 1930s. Canon Donaldson in Westminster Abbey was known as the "red" canon having been appointed by Ramsay MacDonald before 1931 when he was still considered a left-winger. There was indeed a bishop of Birmingham appointed in the same way and there have been some more recent occasions when diocesan or indeed arch-diocesan appointments have been areas in which the Prime Minister has wished to be involved. I went back to look at the 2008 White Paper Governance of Britain in which it clearly states that after full consultations, it was decided that the Prime Minister, who for these purposes, exercises the royal prerogative, will in future, ""ask for only one name which he will then forward to Her Majesty The Queen"." It goes on to say at paragraph 256, and in this I think we were slightly misled in the evidence we were given at the Ecclesiastical Committee, that: ""The changes to the appointments processes for Diocesan Bishops and Cathedral Deans are internal Church procedures and require no legislation."" The reason why we are discussing this here is that for suffragan bishops, it does require legislation. So the suggestions which were made by two members of the Ecclesiastical Committee that this was not necessarily an accepted change, and that a future Government might wish to reinstate political appointment for diocesan and arch-diocesan appointments, would, I think, be rather controversial and should not pass without mention. I would not wish the Church of England to become again in any way the Tory party of prayer, or to be the representation of the Christian Socialist Fellowship, or any other body. While I support the continuation of the established church, I think it is highly desirable that the church should be outside and above party politics. I therefore entirely accept and strongly agree with the statements in the 2008 White Paper, as did indeed the clear and overwhelming majority of the members of the Ecclesiastical Committee present at our last meeting. I just wish to mark this occasion that this is not entirely without a degree of controversy and I very much welcome the acceptance by the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, of the proposals.