A Truly Modernised House Of Lords? First, Banish the Bishops’ Bench

The increased activity of the bishops in the House of Lords – as claimed in today’s Theos ‘think tank’ report – gives further ammunition to the argument that the Lords Spiritual should be abolished.

Keith Porteous Wood, Executive Director of the National Secular Society, said: “If the research from Theos is correct, and the bishops are becoming more active and influential in the House of Lords, then the case for getting rid of them is strengthened. The bishops claim to represent the country, but the evidence shows that they are completely out of step with the population at large. The last big push by the bishops was to defeat the Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill bill, which according to opinion polls was supported by over 80 per cent of the electorate.

“They also use their positions as bishops to table amendments for self-serving purposes. They tabled an amendment last year to dismantle long-standing protections against discrimination against non-religious staff in publicly funded faith schools. This prejudiced the jobs or career prospects of tens of thousands of publicly funded head teachers and teaching assistants. The Church demanded and received massive exemptions from anti-discrimination employment regulations for ‘organised religion’. The exemptions were granted without consultation with those adversely affected by the exemption.”

Mr Wood said that the bishops cannot possibly be representative of the country as a whole when they are all men, all from one small denomination of one particular religion representing English dioceses. “On the average Sunday less than a million people (two percent of the population) worship at the Church of England, yet this tiny denomination has 26 representatives sitting as of right in the nation’s legislature.”

Mr Porteous Wood said that Jack Straw’s argument that removing the Bishops’ Bench would be tantamount to disestablishment was incorrect. Getting rid of the Bishops’ Bench from the upper chamber does not affect the establishment of the Church of England at all. They bishops sit there because in medieval times the church was a major landowner and its bishops were regarded as advisors to the king. Only in more modern times have they become associated with establishment and in law the two aspects are quite separate*.

Every other western democracy has realised the presence by right of clerics in their legislature is an affront to democracy and the bishops’ sell-by date is long past. Jack Straw should recognise that if he wants to truly modernise the House of Lords, such anachronisms will have to be eliminated. The reality is that the Government, or perhaps Mr Blair, has given the churches practically everything they have asked for, and are now running scared of removing the bishops.”

* Modernising Parliament - Reforming the House of Lords White Paper December 1998 Column 4183 Chapter 3 Para 6.