A week in which the Government’s proposals on judicial review got a kicking from Parliament, the proposal to relocate the Bishop of Bath and Wells got the thumbs-down from the Archbishops’ Council and an atheist synod was announced…
The Joint Committee on Human Rights and judicial review
On Wednesday the Joint Committee on Human Rights published its Report on The implications for access to justice of the Government’s proposals to reform judicial review. Its conclusion is a pretty comprehensive rejection of the Government’s proposals for reform. The Committee does not
“… consider the Government to have demonstrated by clear evidence that judicial review has ‘expanded massively’ in recent years as the Lord Chancellor claims, that there are real abuses of the process taking place, or that the current powers of the courts to deal with such abuse are inadequate” (paragraph 30).
Moreover:
“… the Government’s proposals on judicial review expose the conflict inherent in the combined roles of the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice … We think the time is approaching for there to be a thoroughgoing review of the effect of combining in one person the roles of Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, and of the restructuring of departmental responsibilities between the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice that followed the creation of the new merged office” (paragraph 23).
Though the detailed nuts-and-bolts of judicial review are somewhat beyond the scope of this blog they are certainly by no means irrelevant: remember R (Hodkin & Anor) v Registrar General of Births, Deaths and Marriages [2013] UKSC 77? For further and better particulars, we would refer readers to the summary on UKHRB by Angela Patrick, Director of Human Rights Policy at JUSTICE, and to the equally helpful post on Public Law for Everyone by Mark Elliott, Reader in Public Law at Cambridge.
Of Popes
Few can have failed to notice the double canonization of the “two Pope saints”: John XXIII and John Paul II on 27 April, details of which have been summarized by the Vatican Information Service, (VIS). Aside from the process of beatification and canonization, for which atheist Simon Jenkins voiced the incredulity of many at their present-day relevance, the blog of John Thavis provided some insights from the Roman Catholic point of view into the preceding debate and the issues of: the fast-tracking of John Paul II; the waiving of the second miracle for John XXIII; the politics of saint-making; and the on-going tensions over the Second Vatican Council. He suggests that “the double canonization is a unifying move by Pope Francis, an attempt to build a bridge between constituencies in the church who identify with the ‘liberal’ John XXIII or the more ‘conservative’ John Paul II”.
Of Bishops
At the Gloucester Diocesan Synod on 1 May, the Bishop of Gloucester, the Right Revd. Michael Perham, addressed the Church of England’s attitude to homosexual people[1]. Commending the Pilling Report, he urged “gracious restraint” by all those within the Church of England during the forthcoming facilitated conversations at national and diocesan level: “to those who condemn the Church of England from other parts of the Anglican Communion he said, “might you hold back while the Church of England reflects?’”. As Kelvin Holdsworth points out, however, this is all very well for opposite sex couples on whom the Church’s extended timetable will have little impact.
With regard to the Anglican Communion (and others), the Archbishop of Wales, the Most Revd. Dr Barry Morgan, was more forthright in his Presidential Address on 23 April to members of the CiW’s Governing Body: he warned that there was no one Christian viewpoint on issues such as same-sex relationships or assisted dying, stating “Holy Scripture itself … is far more nuanced, subtle and complex than we often realise….. We cannot just quote Biblical texts on different subject matters and think that that settles an issue”.
The Bishop of Newcastle, the Right Reverend Martin Wharton, has announced his forthcoming retirement, which under the Ecclesiastical Offices (Age Limit) Measure 1975 will be before his 70th birthday on 6 August 2014. As a consequence, he will step down from the Lords Spiritual, and a new appointment will be made on the basis of seniority.
On 2 May, Downing Street reported that the Queen had approved the nomination of four new Suffragan bishops in the Dioceses of York and Chelmsford: John Thomson (Selby), Paul Ferguson (Whitby), Roger Morris (Colchester), and Peter Hill (Barking).
Of bishops’ residences
On Thursday it was announced that the committee of the Archbishops’ Council appointed to consider the proposal to relocate the new Bishop of Bath and Wells from the Palace at Wells to the Old Rectory, Croscombe, had upheld the objections to the proposal. This is the first time the procedure has been used; and though the decision is very much an internal matter for the Church of England, the legal framework surrounding it is interesting in itself and we shall post a note on it later in the week.
Is the UK a “Christian country”?
In last week’s roundup we noted the pop-up debate on whether or not “Britain” is a Christian country. Bob Morris, of UCL, kindly provided a guest post looking at some of the wider implication of the controversy. We also looked at the legal framework for depriving a Church of its property in the context of Article 1 Protocol 1 ECHR on peaceful enjoyment: we concluded that, whatever may have happened in the past to the Church of Ireland and the Welsh dioceses of the Church of England, that was then and this is now.
Church visitors, tower tours, and health & safety
Also in relation to Wells was the news this week that a visitor on a “High Parts” tour of the Cathedral had fallen 9 metres and become wedged in a void between two walls 46 metres inside the bell tower[2]. The visitor, who was part of a small group escorted by two volunteer guides, was suspected to have sustained broken wrists, a broken pelvis and abdominal injuries, and was airlifted from roof of the Cathedral by helicopter.
This incident is a reminder that although churches and cathedrals are generally low-risk areas, they are associated with significant hazards which need to be identified, minimized and supported by emergency procedures. The Health and Safety Executive was made aware of the incident and is in discussion with the local authority. We will keep readers informed of the outcome of these investigations and any guidance or recommendations that are made.
Tower tours are a common fundraising event used by churches, and it is important that an appropriate risk assessment is made, written procedures included in its health and safety documentation, the event adequately manned, and responsibilities identified. As we have noted in one of our earliest posts, now is the time when each newly-elected PCCs will be sorting out its agenda for the coming year following the statutory Annual Parish Meeting, and this is a suitable occasion on which to review their church(es) Health and Safety arrangements.
Perinatal cremation in Edinburgh
We noted the report by the former Lord Advocate, Dame Elish Angiolini, commissioned by Edinburgh City Council to look into the practices of Mortonhall Crematorium. Mortonhall failed to provide parents with the ashes of their babies; and the report notes that “whether by use of a foetal cremator or modified practices in an adult cremator, or a combination of both, there is a need for detailed, authoritative professional guidance on how best to maximise the recovery of ashes from the cremation of babies”. Dame Elish also recommends that the Scottish Government should commission research to identify best practice.
New blogs, closed blogs, closing blogs
On 3 May, Thinking Anglicans announced the launch of a new blog, Thinking Liturgy, which “will focus on the link between the way that we worship and the social justice that we proclaim”: the main TA blog with its primary focus on issues of social justice will continue.
“Thinking Liturgy will cover a range of liturgical topics and news, not confined to any particular theological or doctrinal stance or ‘churchmanship’, though it will be largely Anglican and English. It will promote good liturgical practice and understanding — not for its own sake, but looking at the impact liturgy makes on working for the kingdom”.
In contrast, 4 May marked the closure as a news service of the Protect the Pope blog, although it is understood that the site and its existing material will remain. Deacon Nick Donnelly’s PtP blog focused on Roman Catholic, non-legal issues, and we are therefore not well placed to comment, other than to wish him and his bishop, Michael Campbell, well in the future.
Of more importance to students of law and religion, the admirable documentation site of the Netherlands Institute of Human Rights has been put into suspended animation and is to go off-line on 1 January 2015. The Institute has taken this decision in view of “the increasing amount of information available elsewhere and the investments that would be required to maintain substantive added value”. Which is very sad news, if entirely understandable in the current economic climate.
And finally … an atheist synod?
The Guardian reported on Tuesday that the avowedly-atheist Sunday Assembly, which predicts that it will have a hundred congregations on five continents by the end of 2014, is to hold its first “general assembly” to set up a system of church-like management, “an event that the group’s organisers acknowledge will be compared to the Church of England’s General Synod”.
Frank suspects that, given the absence of clergy, it will probably look more like a Quaker Yearly Meeting than General Synod or Methodist Conference – though, presumably, without the concomitant Quaker business method. However, the report does illustrate a very serious point for religious lawyers of whatever persuasion: there soon comes a moment at which any religious body (however you define “religious”) will need at least some basic rules and structure of governance.
At the very least, as soon as an organisation starts to own or lease property it is going to need an organised group of people to take day-to-day responsibility for the premises. It is, of course, possible to operate as an unincorporated voluntary organisation – but even that, once it exceeds the point at which everyone can participate in decision-making, will probably need some kind of day-to-day executive. So much as some people would like to consign “ecclesiastical law” (or whatever else you might prefer to call it) to the bin, there’s no escaping it in one form or another.