HC Deb 25 July 1950 vol 478 cc393-4

11.16 p.m.

Sir Richard Acland (Gravesend)

I beg to move, That the Incumbents (Discipline) Measure, 1947 (Amendment) Measure, 1950, passed by the National Assembly of the Church of England, be presented to His Majesty for his Royal Assent in the form in which the said Measure was laid before Parliament. As a Motion of this shape and kind does not often come before the House, hon. Members will wish me perhaps to give a few words in explanation of an extremely short Measure. It has been before the Ecclesiastical Committee of the House, which reports that: It is not controversial, does not affect prejudicially the constitutional rights of any of His Majesty's subjects and that it is expedient that it should be proceeded with. The sole purposes of this Measure is to correct a mistake that was made in an earlier Measure. I apologise to the House for this mistake which is taking up a couple of minutes of its time now, and perhaps my apology will be the more readily accepted if I briefly explain the genesis of the mistake.

There was a Measure called the Benefices (Ecclesiastical Duties) Measure of 1926, which was in three parts. In 1947, there was introduced the Incumbents (Discipline) Measure which at first was thought to supersede the whole of the earlier Measure. While this later Measure was in course of passing, it was observed that Part II of the earlier Measure, which deals with the stipends of curates, was not covered by the later Measure, and the draftsmen dealt with this discovery by repealing Parts I and III, instead of repealing the whole Measure, and this seemed to deal with the matter adequately.

On closer inspection it become clear that this simple method of dealing with it had in effect left unrepealed two Schedules which ought to be repealed, and repealed three Clauses which ought not to have been repealed. This Measure now before the House corrects that mistake. The two Schedules depended entirely upon Part I of the earlier Measure which was correctly repealed, and the three wrongly repealed Clauses dealt respectively with the subjects of short title, the extent and the repeal of yet earlier Measures. It is certain that no one has either been advantaged or disadvantaged by this mistake, which had not been detected by anyone until it was detected by the legal experts of the Church Assembly.

Mr. Percy Morris (Swansea, West)

I beg to second the Motion.

Question put, and agreed to.