Channel Islands Measure

Motion to Direct

That this House do direct that, in accordance with the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act 1919, the Channel Islands Measure be presented to Her Majesty for the Royal Assent.

My Lords, I shall give some brief historical and current background to the Channel Islands Measure, then outline its content.

Until the 16th century, the Channel Islands were part of the Church of France and the diocese of Coutances. In 1496, Henry VII obtained a papal bull transferring the islands to the English diocese of Salisbury, but it seems this was not put into effect. The islands finally became part of the Church of England in 1569, when they were transferred to the diocese of Winchester by Order in Council of Elizabeth I. Since then, the Church of England has been the established Church of the islands.

In July 2018, the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury appointed a commission, chaired by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Chartres, whom I am glad is in your Lordships’ hybrid House today, to consider and report on the relationship between the Channel Islands and the wider Church of England. The appointment of the commission followed a breakdown in the relationship between the Channel Islands and the diocese of Winchester. The origins of that unhappy situation concerned the way in which a safeguarding issue from 2008, involving a vulnerable adult, was dealt with.

In the midst of a thorough analysis, and following wide-ranging submissions and meetings, the Archbishop’s commission, in paragraph 19, covers an investigation by Dame Heather Steel—the subject of the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner. The outcome of that investigation, announced on 23 November 2013, was that no disciplinary action was taken against any member of the islands’ clergy. I understand that was on the basis of legal advice, but the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Winchester did not, as he originally intended, publish Dame Heather’s review.

The Archbishop’s commission reported in September 2019, and concluded that while there remained

“residual affection for the historic attachment to … Winchester”,

the difficulties in the relationship between the islands and the diocese were such that the breakdown was

“too great for it to be retrieved in the foreseeable future.”

Having considered various options, the commission came to the conclusion that the islands should be transferred to the diocese of Salisbury. It pointed to several advantages: access is relatively easy, via Southampton Airport or by ferry to Poole; the capacity of the diocese of Salisbury, having two suffragan bishops in addition to the diocesan bishop, is sufficient. There are historical connections, as I have mentioned, between the islands and Salisbury: the attempted connection in 1496, and the fact that the first bishop to visit the islands and carry out confirmations since the Reformation was the then Bishop of Salisbury in 1818. The diocese of Salisbury today shares legal services with the diocese of Winchester and, given the particular legal context of the islands, it is advantageous to retain that relevant knowledge and experience.

The commission recommended that a Measure should be introduced to enable the transfer from Winchester to Salisbury. The Measure before your Lordships’ House gives effect to the recommendation of the Archbishop’s commission. It also speaks about some other matters relating to the Church of England and the Channel Islands.

Section 1 is the key provision. It provides that Her Majesty may, by Order in Council, attach the Channel Islands to the diocese of Salisbury instead of the diocese of Winchester, and transfer the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Winchester’s jurisdiction in relation to the islands to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Salisbury. I should add that both right reverend Prelates and dioceses are content with that outcome, as are the Channel Islands. Section 2 makes consequential amendments to existing Church legislation concerned with the Channel Islands, so that references to Winchester become references to Salisbury.

On Section 3, as noble Lords will know, Jersey and Guernsey are separate legal jurisdictions. Normally, legislation passed by Parliament, including Church legislation, does not automatically extend to the Channel Islands. However, it is often desirable for United Kingdom statute law to be capable of extension to the Channel Islands with the co-operation with the islands’ own legislative bodies. There are established procedures for extending Acts of Parliament and Church Measures to the islands. In the case of Church Measures, the procedure was originally established in 1931. It is an elaborate and time-consuming procedure and, as a result, there is a backlog of Church legislation that ought to be extended to the islands. Section 3 will enable Church legislation to be extended to the islands much more simply under more straightforward procedures established by their respective legislatures. That should mean that the backlog can be cleared and any future delays can be avoided in extending appropriate Church legislation to the islands.

Section 4 makes updating amendments so that eligibility for inclusion on the islands’ church electoral rolls is on the same basis as for church electoral rolls in England. Those rolls, which are island-wide rather than parochial, identify the electorate in elections from the islands to the General Synod of the Church of England. The changes being made include reducing the minimum age for enrolment from 17 to 16 and, as in England, members of other Christian Churches who are prepared to declare that they are also members of the Church of England will be able to be enrolled. The last section, Section 5, provides for the commencement of the Measure and its Short Title.

The Measure was passed with large majorities in all houses of the General Synod, and the Ecclesiastical Committee, some of whose members I am glad are with us this evening, issued a favourable report, which has been laid before the House. I beg to move.

Amendment to the Motion

Moved by

At end insert “but that this House regrets that the Ecclesiastical Committee was not given the opportunity to consider the report of the investigation carried out by Dame Heather Steel into the handling of safeguarding issues by the church in Jersey.”

My Lords, I have taken the unusual step of tabling an amendment of regret to the Motion moved so ably by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Birmingham, because it is demonstrably clear to me as a member of the Ecclesiastical Committee that a senior and distinguished member of the clergy, the very reverend Bob Key, the former Dean of Jersey, had suffered a grave injustice at the hands of the Church of England during the events that led up to the decision on 9 March 2013 to strip him of his commission over the safeguarding issue to which the right reverend Prelate referred.

That followed publication of an investigation carried out for the Winchester diocese by a psychotherapist called Miss Jan Korris. Her report was highly critical of the dean but contained serious flaws. As the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Chartres, said in his brilliant report on the relationship of the Channel Islands to the wider Church of England:

“That there were flaws may, in significant measure, be attributable to the fact that the draft report was published on the diocesan website before the participants could take advantage of the offer provided by Ms Korris to give them the draft report”

before publication.

Adding to the hurt caused to the dean and to others on Jersey, it remained there until 2016 and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Winchester and the dean never met to discuss it. The dean was reinstated on 28 April 2013, but not before considerable distress was caused to him and his wife and much damage done to the relationship between the diocese of Winchester and the church in Jersey.

In the next month, a further inquiry was commissioned by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Winchester under the chairmanship of Dame Heather Steel, a former judge of the High Court of Justice and the courts of appeal on Jersey and Guernsey. A full-page advertisement in the name of the right reverend Prelate was inserted in the Jersey Evening Post on 3 August 2013 about the Steel investigation. It included the words:

My Lords, I am grateful to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Birmingham for setting out so clearly the background to and information on the Motion. I can see that this is extremely complicated and distressing; I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner, for setting out the distressing background to this Measure.

The Church of England, of which I am a member, has some very obscure mechanisms for dealing with its internal operations—something that Trollope would still recognise if he were alive today. I am well used to parishes being moved to different deaneries as the number of worshippers changes and the availability of clergy in post diminishes. I am also used to some deaneries disappearing altogether and the boundaries of others being extended, but this is the first time I have come across a transfer from one diocese to another. Of course, it may be much more common than I imagine and just has not crossed my radar before.

The Channel Islands are a very distinctive community. Guernsey and Jersey have their own legislatures. They are beautiful, interesting and have a good climate. Most of us know this, and know that they are the only UK soil to have been invaded during the Second World War. Therefore, it seems all the more poignant that they should have suffered the sorry tale of the events that we are debating today. Safeguarding can be a thorny problem; if it is not handled well, there are ramifications for a number of people on the sidelines.

There are sure to be differences of opinion on both sides about the outcome, and having read the briefing paper, I believe that moving the Channel Islands from the Winchester diocese to that of Salisbury is the right way forward. Following the report of the commission of the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Chartres, on 10 February the General Synod Business Committee decided that the measure should pass to the final approval stage, which it did on 13 February. There it was passed overwhelmingly by all three houses: bishops, clergy and laity. I do not believe that engaging in the delay that would have occurred had Dame Heather Steel’s report been considered by the Ecclesiastical Committee was necessary.

My Lords, unlike other distinguished Members of this House who have taken part in this debate, and who in some cases have enormous experience of these issues, I have no interests to declare of close connections to the hierarchy of the Church of England, and I have been a not too regular communicant over the years. However, I am a lawyer, and am most interested to see equity and justice.

At one level this is a simple transfer of oversight over the Channel Islands or bailiwicks from one mainland diocese to another—from Winchester to Salisbury—but to me, as a relative outsider, it raises a number of questions, especially now that I have read the papers and reports, from the commission of the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury, so ably chaired by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Chartres, and the Ecclesiastical Committee’s evidence session on 19 June. I have concluded that a set of unfortunate human relations breakdowns and misunderstandings are the basis of these proposals. Is that a good enough reason for this massive constitutional change? There have been a number of problems, not just one, but is this not using a mallet to crack a nut? Can the right reverend Prelate comment on this?

Also, it appears that there has been a long period—some seven years—with no proper relationship in place between the islands and the mainland Church. Was this not detrimental to the care and protection of the islanders? Looking at the historical issues, the link with the Winchester diocese has, as the right reverend Prelate pointed out, been maintained since 1569, through war and peace, so simply replacing one diocese with another without the same long connection needs a good reason. As the commission’s report also states, none of this should be agreed without a more thorough examination of the legal and constitutional relationships between the Channel Islands and the mainland in Church matters. Again, the excellent report of the commission highlights that mere understandings going back 400 years were not really sufficient to handle disciplinary matters or changes in international human rights rules, and not sufficiently precise in direction to deal with disputes between islands and mainland, and, more practically, between different grades in the Church hierarchy.

My Lords, I am very glad to follow those comments by the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope. He raises some very pertinent questions, which I shall attempt to address as someone who chaired this commission, as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Birmingham said in his excellent introduction. I was very fortunate in my fellow commissioners, to whom I pay tribute. One is a distinguished Member of your Lordships’ House, the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, and the other is the eminent and learned judge, Sir Christopher Clarke.

The noble Lord, Lord Faulkner, very properly described the painful sequence of events. There had been a breakdown in relations between the diocese of Winchester and the church and deaneries of Jersey and Guernsey. We discovered, through our visits to the islands and interviews with the various interested parties, a desire for reconciliation on all sides, but a general agreement that there was no going back. The noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, very properly asked what the interim measures were. As a matter of fact, interim oversight of the church in Jersey and Guernsey was given to an assistant bishop in the diocese of Winchester, Bishop Trevor Willmott, to whom I pay tribute and who did some extraordinarily good work.

The hope is that this new structure will enable us to move forward and, in course of time, will lead to a healing of memories. But, as the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, suggested, it is clear that much of the difficulty arose because of a lack of clarity about the respective roles of the diocesan bishop and the deans of Jersey and Guernsey in the context of the very particular constitutional and legal traditions of the Channel Islands. It was our task as a commission not to pass judgment on the controversies of the past but to identify a clear way forward that would both recognise the enhanced responsibilities of modern bishops in contemporary culture—particularly for matters such as safeguarding—and respect the particular traditions of the Channel Islands.

My Lords, we are used to seeing some fairly strange-looking bits of legislation coming from the Church of England and going through Parliament but, when I first looked at this, I wondered what it was and did a quick double take, because it is not usual to move control from one diocese to another. Then a little bit of digging seemed to expose something that was basically—well, the cock-up school of history is what comes to mind. There has been a huge row that it seems could not be resolved except by a huge change in management. I may be oversimplifying it and missing one or two of the finer points, but I do not think so.

The noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Chartres, has just given us more background, and my noble friend Lady Bakewell summed up what would probably be my attitude at the end of this—but the questions initially asked by the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, need reiterating. So, when he sums up, can the right reverend Prelate say what lessons have formally been learned and what processes will be brought into place to stop this sort of thing happening again, or at least make it less likely?

If you have something where information is not coming out and people do not know exactly what is going on, reputations are getting damaged and it is going on for longer, that is basically a failure of the system, regardless of the initial complaint. Can we have an assurance that, at the end of this, the Church, which is the established Church and an official part of our nation, will have better management processes in place? That is what we deserve to get out of it, as do all those involved and all the parishioners.

It may be further complicated because of the status of the Channel Islands but, with such a process and knowing that the institution itself has taken these things on board and is looking at them, we can take away from this at least some reassurance that it will not happen again or, at least, if it does, things will be dealt with that little bit quicker.

My Lords, it is fairly clear that all this sprang from obscurity of legislation, so it is very proper that we should use these processes to bring legislation into clarity. One thing that must be done is that the ledgers, tomes or articles of recollection that are kept in the bailiwick and the new associated diocese must be inscribed with advice to successive holders of the three offices that they must maintain close communication with each other as a matter of course and immediately bring to light any case where there is disagreement about the meaning of the legislation or the other documents that regulate the procedures.

In essence, the Ecclesiastical Committee seems to have agreed to a new body of law, and that is how it should be maintained. It is deeply regrettable that it was such a painful experience that brought the ambiguity to light. It will be small consolation to those who have suffered that things have now been arranged so that it is unlikely to occur again. However, the debate that we are having now offers them the same solace that the Archbishop of Canterbury has done, and that is the least that can be said now.