One of our regular readers, @CommentatorIntl, has asked, “Why are there still Bishops in the Lords?” Good Question.
The short answer is that successive Prime Ministers and Governments have been too scared of all the other reactionary elements to want to take on the Church of England as well.
However, the history of the presence of the Prelates in Parliament suggests a more complex situation, as one of their number has explained it to me. In mediaeval times, the Bishops were such huge feudal landlords, and had such huge economic power as a result, that no Monarch could risk going to war without their consent to the necessary fundraising. At various periods, indeed, the “Lords Spiritual” outnumbered the “Lord Temporal”. At one time, all the Abbots and Abbesses were here too (the first women in the English Parliament, were therefore pre-Reformation nuns!). When Henry VIII broke with Rome he, wisely or timidly, decided not to risk yet another enemy and quietly incorporated the Bishops in the new House of Lords. Thus, strictly speaking, the presence of the Bishops has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the Established Church, as I understand it.
Even if you are, like me, a practising Anglican, there is no rational reason for the Bishops to remain in a reformed House of Lords. For the busiest people in any denomination, or faith group, to have to split their time between their other commitments and the legislature is obviously unreasonable. Indeed, I recently heard a Bishop complain that he might have to attend on two days in the week, which would interrupt his other duties. There may be a case, if there are to be any appointees, for the various faith groups to nominate individuals, but that’s another matter and clearly very different to giving automatic seats – based on hierarchy – to only one denomination.
Occasionally, commentators suggest that the Bishops Bench is there as a sort of moral compass for the nation. In my humble opinion, every single Parliamentarian – whether Christian, of another faith, or none at all – should have a conscience which they are prepared to consult as part of their work here. MPs and Peers should not sub-contract morality to such a select sect.
So, the answer to that question is: “you may well ask!” Do I think that the proposed reforms will lead to the defenestration of all Bishops? Frankly, I wouldn’t bet on it!
For once, I find myself largely agreeing with you. If a reformed House is entirely elected, any bishops or other faith representatives should have to seek election like anyone else. (If the public really want these people to speak for them, they’ll elect them, right?) If the reformed House has appointed members, bishops should have to go through the same appointment process as anyone else. There is no justification for retaining bishops as ex officio members in a reformed House of Lords. The arguments for changing the current arrangement of life peers apply equally well to the bishops.
As the so called Christian Anglican church no longer adheres to the message of that philosophy, one has to ask if those who run the show have any conscience the majority of the Christian people of this nation would connect to or remember as the teachings they received in their formative years.
Their purpose was lost when they decided to ‘change’ the teachings of Christ to some other doctrine we really have little knowledge of, can understand or want to.
The single follower’s of the Christian ethos remain Roman Catholics. And that organisation is despised by those who cling to the new and so called reformed enlightenment.
The best offer for Spiritual guidance for the Lords is the proportion of citizens of their particular faith in the country. How many Roman Catholics are there? How many Jews, Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists, and so on. Then, spread the Spiritual seats thus.
That way everyone is happy. A medley of the sacred.
The problem comes when you have to pay mind to their idea of what is ‘right’ and ‘good’ as a policy. It will be a fight between turn the other cheek and off with their head. Not much different from the general make up of the population as a whole, is it?
Lord Tyler’s explanation is so simple that I had never thought of it.
Even in the mid 17thC there was a “Westminster assembly of Divines”, during the interregnum, which the top bishops attended.
The question of church possessions might support the continued membership of half a dozen bishops/archbishops, since the CofE still has fairly extensive land and housing interests, even after a debacle of losses during the 1990s.
Both CofE and Catholic have concentrated on
developing income generating assets in the last 30 years, in the form of new churches in new and developing towns. Thus the town of Crawley has half a dozen new churches of both denominations, with the attendant “giving” of enthusiastic happy clapping congregations.
I have a conscience if I don’t mow the lawn.
I would not expect parliament to be peopled by monks or the unpaid, but fat Franciscans
pretending to be poor, would be disgusting!
I have recently taken up the Third Way, religiously, as a member of the Labour party.
>The question of church possessions might support the continued membership of half a dozen bishops/archbishops, since the CofE still has fairly extensive land and housing interests, even after a debacle of losses during the 1990s.
I’d beg to differ.
That would suggest membership ex-Officio by the Chair of the National Trust !
It seems to me that it is long past “high time” for the Upper House to be re-classifying its Membership.
“Temporality” (& vel versus) “Spirituality” surely being nowadays far too “simplistic” or “foggily indiscriminating”, to both holisticly and expertly represent the Needs & Hows of The People and of the Earth’s-Lifesupports thereto.
In three ‘corners’ of the Upper House there is a loopholery of “behind-the-times” expertises;
and in the one ‘corner’ a dearth of both know-how and dogma for the implementation of holistic spiritual-mind-body-environment enablements or micro-enablements (in the Lifeplace, to match as it were the Skills or micro-skills of the Workplace):
the three corners being filled by the Lords Temporal and the one corner by the Lords Spiritual.
To gain a clue as to what I’m trying to say here, please refer to “Lifestreams” by David Boadella, “Anatomy of the Spirit” by Caroline Myss, and either “Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery” by Eric Franklin or “The New Rules of Posture” by Mary Bond.
And I daresay the “Guest Lord” Baroness Neuberger’s post above (“A nudge in the wrong direction?”) would connect with a sound quantity and quality of knowledge and know-how for application in this matter of
‘what expertises must the Upper House provide seats for’ ?
( in which Lord Tyler appears to want the ‘Lords Spiritual’ “Episcopally Evicted”).
Could any of this be so ?
1153T19July11.JSDM.
That would suggest membership ex-Officio by the Chair of the National Trust !
Quite so but the management structure and articles of incorporation are somewhat different.
The CofE real estate including the churches, would in terms of precedence be equable perhaps with a non Royal dukedom of 50,000 acres.
I was interested to read the term “Royal republic” with regard to the Papal estates of the early 17thC, and I am wondering about its precise meaning.
The notion of Sovereignty touted by the newly named SMOM(Sovereign Military Order of Malta)might be a useful one in the context of 100% democratic elections to the HofL.
The Queen is indeed Head of the Church of England, in its various very real incarnations, throughout the world, membership of English Bishops in the HofL,or not.
That would suggest membership ex-Officio by the Chair of the National Trust !
Quite so but the management structure and articles of incorporation are somewhat different.
The CofE real estate including the churches, would in terms of precedence be equable perhaps with a non Royal dukedom of 50,000 acres.
I was interested to read the term “Royal republic” with regard to the Papal estates of the early 17thC, and I am wondering about its precise meaning.
The notion of Sovereignty touted by the newly named SMOM(Sovereign Military Order of Malta)might be a useful one in the context of 100% democratic elections to the HofL.
The Queen is indeed Head of the Church of England, in its various very real incarnations, throughout the world, membership of English Bishops in the HofL,or not.
“…Governments have been too scared…”
I suppose we might as well defenestrate the First Estate while we’re at it.
We should abolish the second chamber.
With something like 80% of all legislation affecting the UK now originating in the EU and much legislation being delegated to national and regional assemblies within the UK, why do we need a second chamber?
A single chamber or unicameral legislature should be capable of undertaking all the scrutiny and review processes required of a legislature to keep the Executive under some degree of democratic control.
The select committees could act as preview bodies for proposed legislation, to ensure it is of a better standard than at present.
Forget elections for the second chamber and just do away with it altogether.
This removes all the arguments about the composition of a second chamber.
@John Dowdle:
The answer is to fully unite with Europe and run the show. Remove idiot stultifying laws and make the place a world beater. We are Europe by blood and situation. Our cultures mesh and our aspirations mirror each other. A bright Parliament would not fight against itself, it would make ingest itself and become whole. That way we would be a nation to reckon with.
Blind men should not be in Parliament.
Most significantly he wants 80 per cent of them to be elected and the remainder appointed with their period of office restricted to 15 years..An additional 12 places would be allocated to the Lords Spiritual Church of England bishops reduced from their current 26. But both were appointed in their personal capacity rather than because of clerical office..There is a near impossibility of agreement on a leaderIn a recent radio debate Rabbi Neuberger argued that since the bishops brought a distinctive contribution to the work of the Lords there was a case for having other faiths formally represented as well.
Talk, talk and more talk. What we need rid of is fiddlers. Those in front and those who hide behind an office of their own.
Lets start with the Kinnocks. Now there is a healthy pair who know how to swing the led. Marta Andreasen MEP UK (UKIP) Brussels, tells us when the good Welshman was European Commission vice president, responsible for anti-fraud and audit, he did all in his power to conceal a blatant lack of control of EU funds coming to light. Now why would he want to conceal it?
She tells us, all he wanted to do was hide his interests from scrutiny. Clearly a man who felt he may be found liable should the truth be known.
Now, why would a House of Lords, who wanted to be open and above board, full to the hilt with a sense of superiority in human integrity, want such an old codger and his lack lustre wife, still doddering in their ranks, creating a smelly stain like that?
In fact, the reduction in the numbers of bishops from 26 to 12 in a reduced second chamber would have the effect of increasing clerical representation from 3 to 4 %.
So, these proposals wil make the second chamber even more undemocratic than it presently is.
As the quoted remarks by Neuburger above bear out, once you let any of them in, you then have to let all of them in. All, of course, on the undemocratic basis that not one of them will have receieved any form of personal mandate from any section of the electorate. It is just a continuation of a form of non-herediraty autocracy.
The easiest way to deal with this problem is to end the practice of a second chamber and just have a single elected chamber.
I must say that the ‘Warner Bros’ Lords Tyler and Adonis sing their Loony Tunes in harmony for a directly elected HoL. The tories are strapped to the mast of a coalition that sails the sea toward a republic, testing the water at every turn whilst sirens sing their alluring song of republican revolution.
Would you Lord Tyler remove the Bishops from the chess board? The game would play easier if you could. Why not remove the King and Queen too?
The Bishops are indirectly elected by the Synod. They cannot object to an indirectly elected house. In such a house they would form part of a secular tribe incorporated to fund and protect their privacy without taking from the public purse. The only concession needed would be the removal of their vestments, a matter of complete indifference to them.
What all must understand is that Lord Tyler is able to sit in the house by the will of the people. The people have also willed that each peer appointed to the house should represent a diverse establishment in one way or another. An indirectly elected house would represent the establishment and that establishment would be accountable to Parliament and the people.
These republican levellers are set about an agenda that would install a Democracy/ Plutocracy hybrid in the manner of the US Congress. Here both houses directly serve the people whilst the obscenely rich remain unaccountable to no one. The political parties pushing a directly elected house are poorly funded and in debt. Whose agenda do they serve; certainly not that of an indifferent public.
Senex: No, the bishops are not elected by Synod (or indeed anyone). They do not represent the views of most C of E members when they repeatedly vote against equality laws.
Mark: I will take the hit! However, some bishops are elected and the principal of indirect elections is well established within the C of E.
Ref: Ranks and Titles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lords_Spiritual
I am not sure I understand Senex fully when s/he says ‘…Lord Tyler is able to sit in the house by the will of the people.’
Paul Tyler was made a life peer in 2005 as a result of nomination by the Liberal Democrat Party. It was some sort of payback for loyalty and services rendered to the party.
How can this be viewed as an expression of ‘the will of the people’?
Any representation by non-elected peers cannot be tied to any group or establishment once they have been appointed for life.
Being a member of a group within the second chamber confers organisational benefits on the individual peer members but they are not irreversibly tied into that group.
Appointment to the second chamber is an expression of political patronage on the part of the senior party leaders. It is their will alone which determines who gets appointed; not the people’s will.
John: Firstly, Lord Tyler comes to the house as a former MP elected by his constituents. Secondly, his appointment arises from an executive whose members are in turn elected by constituents. Unlike Lord Blagger who just appointed himself to the blog Lord Tyler arrives by the will of the people. I didn’t say which people.
Senex: Paul Tyler resigned from the House of Commons prior to the May 2005 general election so there is no sense in which he represented his constituents when he entered the second chamber. He was proposed a peer by the Lib Dems on 13 May 2005. So, at the time at which he entered the second house (16 June 2005) he was no longer an elected parliamentary representative for anyone. Yet again, party cronyism ensured he obtained his place on the peers’ benches.
The party executives are not elected by constituents but are variously appointed by various procedures varying between semi-democratic and virtually non-democratic.
The only people’s will that sent Paul Tyler to the second chamber were those of a tiny, tiny fraction of the overall population.
You really must get a grip on understanding how the real world of politics works.
If there are to be representatives of religion in parliamnet , Humanists should be included. How about astrologers? Russell Grant- widely followed by more than most bishops!