CHANCEL REPAIR BILL [Lords]. (Hansard, 8 April 1932)

§ The ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir Thomas Inskip)
I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
The object of this Bill, which, I hope, will prove to be non-controversial, is to remove the ancient jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts, in cases of disputed liability with regard to the repair of chancels, to the county court, and I hope that everyone will think that it is a convenient way of dealing with a question which became of public importance in consequence of the imprisonment of a farmer two years ago in what was called the Hauxton chancel case. If I thought any hon. Members would stay to listen to me I should be happy to make some observations about the nature of chancels and the liability for their repair and the position of lay appropriators and generally discourse about tithe and tithe rentcharge and the land into which tithe rent-charge has often been converted. Suffice it, however, to say that the duty of repairing the chancel of an ancient parish church is annexed to the ownership of rectorial property which formerly was tithe, then became tithe rentcharge, and is now converted sometimes into land or sometimes into an annuity or a capital sum.
In the course of time the rectorial property to which I have referred passed into the hands of the old monastic houses; from then it passed to the Crown and then to the corporations or individuals who were called appropriators. The duty of the repair of the chancel was an undivided one, but in course of time when the land to which the tithe rentcharge had been converted was in many cases split up by sale or otherwise, the duty of 522 the repair of the chancel fell upon every single owner or any portion of the land. It might be half-a-dozen persons or 50 or 100. In the case already mentioned a gentleman named Mr. Stevens bought a piece of land in ignorance of the fact that it had formerly been part of rectorial property in connection with which there was a liability to repair the chancel of Hauxton with Newton. He was found liable and admonished. That was all that the Ecclesiastical Court could do. They had no power to enforce the admonishment. Three hundred years ago they could, no doubt, have excommunicated Mr. Stevens and, no doubt, he would then have repaired the chancel, but he thought he had a grievance and he did not repair the chancel.
The Ecclesiastical Court having no power of its own then resorted to a more up-to-date procedure which came into existence in the reign of George III when an attempt was made to modernise the Elizabethan statute. Under this procedure the Ecclesiastical Court referred the matter to the civil courts, and after some picturesquely archaic proceedings in the King's Bench Division, Mr. Stevens went to gaol and remained there until he made appropriate satisfaction which included the repair of the chancel. In the circumstances, most people thought that an unsatisfactory state of things had been disclosed by these proceedings, and a, committee was appointed by the Lord Chancellor to inquire into the proper course to be taken, and it was thought by that committee that it was best to follow the example set some years ago in connection with tithe rentcharge, the collection of which, by legal process, was given over to the county courts. Accordingly, the Bill proposes that the ancient jurisdiction of the Ecclesiastical Courts shall be abolished and that we shall allow the county court to be given this jurisdiction. The county court will be able to enforce its own judgments and will not need to admonish a man, but there will be an ordinary claim for the cost of repairing the chancel, giving him an opportunity, if he so pleases, of repairing it himself.

§ Mr. GROVES
Who will repair the chancel?

§ The ATTORNEY-GENERAL
The person upon whom the duty falls—the owner of the piece of land in question. The 523 Bill is to simplify proceedings and prevent the possibility of anybody being sent to gaol for what is really a civil matter, under a wholly archaic and obsolete piece of law, I think, according to our modern ideas. I hope the House will feel it proper to give a Second Reading to the Measure and allow it to go in due course to a Committee of the House.

§ Dr. PETERS
I rise to express my gratification that this Bill has been introduced by the Government. It arose out of a question which I brought before the House in 1929, just after John Henry Stevens had been put into prison, and I am wondering whether the parish council or some other 'body of people in Hauxton may at some future date erect a stained glass window to John Henry Stevens as the last martyr to go to prison. I welcome the Bill, but I must point out to the learned Attorney-General that it does not follow precisely the report of the Chancel Repairs Committee. I speak from the point of view of a solicitor who knows something about the practice in county courts, and there are certain references which I should like to have made if time permitted, but I hope that in Committee we can have various Amendments made to make this a really workable proposition. On reading Clause 2, it will be seen that it is absolutely incomplete and that it would have been far better to have incorporated in the Bill the recommendation of the Committee. With that indication of suggestions that I have to make, I wish to support the Motion for Second Reading.