Amendment of the Constitution of the House of Lords (Bishops) (Hansard, 19 February 1986)

§ Mr. Richard Holt (Langbaurgh)

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the constitution of the House of Lords in relation to membership of bishops and to make consequential provision.

Frequently, when I am asked what is needed to be a Member of Parliament I reply, patience, a strong constitution and a loud voice. Never does that apply quite so much as when one has a ten-minute Bill. Patience in this context goes back to the year 1301, because my ten-minute Bill seeks to amend the constitution. It is sometimes thought that we do not have a written constitution and that everything is by precedent. That is very often true, but for bishops it is untrue. The place of bishops in the House of Lords is enshrined in law and has been ever since laws were validated in this country.

I was surprised to find from my researches that the number of bishops first established by Henry VIII in 1550 was 26. Today, we still have 26. After all those years, the number is the same. There have been changes, such as the disestablishment of the Welsh Church and the Irish Church, and other changes over the years, but in spite of them the number of bishops in the other place has remained constant at 26—two archbishops and 24 bishops.

The restoration Act laid down that the five senior prelates—the two archbishops, the Bishop of Durham, the Bishop of London arid the Bishop of Winchester—shall sit in the House of Lords as of right. All the other bishops take Buggins' turn to bring the numbers up. That was established by statute in 1847.

Why, as a Member of the House of Commons, am I seeking to alter the constitution of the House of Lords? The answer is that that is the way in which it has always been done. The Commoners have initiated the legislation, the Lords have rejected it, and ultimately the Commoners have made it law. I want to strengthen the House of Lords, and I think that one way to do that is to ensure that it reflects the more ecumenical society in which we live and is a true reflection of the nation. I also hope that in that way we would have greater integration of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

It is significant that right back to Henry VIII's Act of 1550 one bishopric only was deliberately excluded—that of Sodor and Man. It is excluded because the bishop who holds that see is automatically a Member of the Manx House. That applies to no bishop other than an English one. This is the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is not the Parliament of England. It should reflect and expand in the House of Lords Church leaders' views from all parts of the country. It should not be confined merely to those in England.

There will be a rumble from people who will say, "This is the short road to disestablishing the Church." I shall remind hon. Members of the report of the Archbishop's commission, "Church and State", which was published in 1970. It said: it is hard to define what is meant by the term 'Church as by law established'." The words … were originally used to denote the statutory prcess by which the allegiance of the Church of England … and the forms of worship and doctrines of that Church were imposed by law.

325 Many right hon. and hon. Members who are here today took part in the famous debate of 1974. I recommend that all hon. Members read the 100 pages of Hansard to see that the measure debated was a step down the road toward what one might call disestablishment, but it has not happened. Like the other snares and red herrings put out from time to time, it is not true. I am not seeking to disestablish anyone. I am trying to establish more people. That will be seen by what I want to introduce into the House of Lords.

The Bill seeks to phase out 12 of the 26 English anglican bishops. The best way to make progress in such matters is slowly, patiently and by negotiation. The law has been around for 355 years, and I do not seek to change it in 10 minutes. Why should I?

I shall go back to the beginning and show why there are any bishops at all in the House of Lords. They are there because King Edward I in 1300 could not read or write and someone had to take the minutes. They put bishops in, and the bishops have been there ever since.

I want the bishops in the House of Lords to reflect society. I seek to introduce there the Moderator of the Church of Scotland, the Archbishop of the Church of Wales, who was shamefully disestablished in 1920 by Lloyd George for political purposes, the Primate of All Ireland and Bishop of Armagh, and the four Catholic cardinals, archbishops or bishops, as appropriate of Westminster, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Armagh, the Methodist Chairman or his nominee and the Chief Rabbi.

I may be criticised for not extending the list to other religions and forms of worship. I am deliberately reducing the numbers by 12 and introducing nine to allow additional people to be put forward for nomination in the fulness of time.

I shall give some of the statistical evidence on various forms of church worship today. In part, the statistics lie behind my thinking. The statistics have been supplied by 326 the House of Commons Library. The best measure that it has is the number of communicants. The Church of England had 1.9 million in 1900 and has 1.5 million today. The Church of Scotland had 1.1 million and now has 900,000. There were 1.9 million Catholics in 1900 and 5 million today. There were 770,000 Methodists and there are now 451,000, and there are 350,000 Jews. Religions without a clear leader do not deserve to be considered, but I do not exclude them. I am trying to introduce harmony, not discord. I am trying to see that in the other place more people bring thoughts and words like those of the Chief Rabbi to parliamentary debates.

I should like to think that everyone, irrespective of the immediate reaction, would like to think about this proposal, because if it saved one life in Northern Ireland it would be a measure well worth introducing.