Love Matters (Archbishops’ Commission on Families and Households Report)

Motion to Take Note

Moved by

That this House takes note of Love Matters, the report of the Archbishops’ Commission on Families and Households.

My Lords, I want to start by thanking the usual channels for allowing me to hold this debate today. I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have come to participate in it, or just to be here for it. On these Benches, we do not take for granted in any way the remarkable privilege of having such a debate roughly once a year; it is a great honour to be allowed to do so.

Families really matter. It is obvious. We know that. However, sometimes we forget why. They are the fundamental building blocks for a flourishing society. This was the motivation for, and the conclusion of, the Archbishops’ Commission on Families and Households, of which the co-chair was the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham.

I pay tribute to the commission’s members, who worked for over two years on this, particularly its chair, Professor Janet Walker, and all those who took part and gave evidence to the commission. It was the last in a series of commissions which grew out of a book I wrote in 2018, Reimagining Britain: Foundations for Hope. The book encouraged us to reimagine society as dedicated to the flourishing of the common good of peoples and communities. The Archbishops’ Commission on Housing, Church and Community reported in 2021 and the Archbishops’ Commission on Reimagining Care reported at the start of this year.

For as long as human beings have existed, we have formed families and households. Families were the birthplace of society itself, and states followed on—they are a later creation. Families are the source of flourishing for so many. At their best, they are the place of belonging and security, of growth, care, healing and reconciliation, of training in being a citizen. They are where we learn to love and be loved, to forgive and to be forgiven. They are where we learn about trust, respect, commitment and values, where we learn to be safe and confident in our identity. But we know that families come in all shapes and sizes in all different societies, and that the shape of the family has changed enormously in our lifetime. They are not simply nuclear.

As the press widely reported when they had nothing better to talk about, my own childhood was messy due to my parents’ alcohol addiction. A few years ago, I, like many people, discovered that the father I had grown up with was not my biological father. Those who, like me, do not grow up in stable immediate families often find hope, comfort and healing in being welcomed into and supported by other loving families, as I was, or extended families. In my case, that included my grandmother, who cared for me in the times when my parents could not. For others, it is an aunt and uncle, a godparent, a loving neighbour.

Households and families—I will call them “families” for short throughout this speech—come in so many shapes and sizes. Those who are single, deliberately or by circumstance, also contribute greatly to households and families through friendship networks and are usually part of extended forms of households. Our families and households grow, adapt and age with us. We see the wonder of familiarity and change, the promise of renewal. If we have children or siblings, we are given the gift of viewing life at both ends—as son and father, granddaughter and grandmother, nephew and uncle.

The commission expressed brilliantly—I had nothing to do with its writing—the opportunity we now have to reimagine a society in which all families, of all shapes and all loving relationships, are valued and strengthened. My right reverend friend the Bishop of Durham will speak more about the commission’s focus on valuing all relationships, including those of people who are single. But family must not be idolised. While very often it is the greatest source of contentment and hope, it can for many be a cause of despair, unhappiness and trauma, the place where our human imperfections—which we know as “sin”—give way to harmful and destructive behaviours.

We all know the statistics on domestic abuse and neglect. The NSPCC estimates that around half a million children suffer abuse in the UK each year, and the Office for National Statistics found that about 5% of adults had experienced abuse in the year ending March 2022. Around 80% of abuse happens within households and families.

In the Bible, family life is messy. Our complex relationships become part of the divine story of God—from Cain and Abel to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob’s family, the beautiful story of Ruth and especially the holy family of Jesus.

So family matters, but what defines families and makes them so crucial for our well-being and for that of society? The answer—it sounds banal, but I will unpack it—is the bonds of love. Yes, of course it is; what else might it be? Well, it is often forgotten.

Throughout the commission’s work, it found in evidence from all places within and outside the Christian or any other faith that “love” was the word most associated with family life, hence the title of the report. The report said:

“Love is undoubtedly the essential characteristic of supportive family life which knows no boundaries and which is expected to endure through the best and the worst of times”.

What do we mean by “love” though? We are not speaking of an emotional feeling. We and the report mean a deep sacrificial commitment to each other, even when it is really hard. Sacrificial love is at the heart of the Christian story, for God so loved the world that he sent his son Jesus Christ both for our salvation, which we believe as Christians, but to model a radical new way of relating to one another, which is self-giving love without expectation of return.

In the Bible, love is described in the most practical way. Here is a passage that almost everyone knows:

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres”.

That passage from 1 Corinthians, chapter 13, is often read out at weddings, but has application far beyond. In my mind’s eye, I see a journey that my wife and I made last year, when we stopped at a service station for a bite to eat. There was a very elderly couple, both finding extreme problems with mobility. They were married to each other and supporting each other as they made their slow and painful way back to their vehicle. That was nothing very dramatic, one might say, but it was a beautiful picture of love—not the love we hear of so much in novels, but resilient, enduring, sacrificing, self-giving love. That is the biblical position on love. It is not just for the benefit of us and our families, but for others. Sacrificial love develops in us the capacity to love and serve without self-interest.

The Children’s Commissioner described a “protective effect” of the family. Family has the power to support its members through life’s challenges. At its best, family is the first port of call in a crisis and a place where we can share both life’s joys and life’s sorrows with others who care for us. A colleague of mine is caring for a family who have just lost the second child in their lives to cancer—a young boy of 11 who died two weeks ago. The wider family has gathered round to bring strength to these people, who have suffered more than most of us can imagine, even those of us who are of that rare and unpleasant club who have lost one child.

That resilience that family brings is especially true for children. Family is the best place for children to grow up and develop resilience, and the evidence of the commission—the evidence, not just a vague thought—is that living with loving birth parents is best, where possible, and when it is not the state has an important role to play in ensuring that children can be integrated into other loving families which are “stable and committed” to one another. Stable and committed is not a question of sexuality, according to the evidence.

The commission found that:

“There is now scientific consensus that the period from conception to age five is critical in providing the foundation for future physical and mental health, as well as overall wellbeing and productivity”.

The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood is an extraordinary foundation doing remarkable work. In 2021, the Government presented a vision, which came partly from its work, for the first

“1,001 … days through pregnancy to the age of two … when the building blocks for lifelong emotional and physical health are laid”.

There is evidence that mothers and fathers play a crucial role in these early years. The protective effect of families is particularly pertinent given the extraordinary rise in mental health challenges visible in both children and adults.

The Church of England Children’s Society concluded in its 2021 Good Childhood Report—an annual production that I strongly commend to noble Lords—that:

“The continuing downward trajectory of children’s happiness with life as a whole, and other important indicators, suggests the UK is struggling to create conditions in which all children can thrive”.

The commission’s call is for all of us, as individuals, communities, government and the Church, to put families at the very centre of all we do.

How can we enable bonds of love to flourish within families and households? Exhortation is useful. Practical aid is essential, and that comes especially through basic needs such as good housing, social care, education, healthcare and nutrition. These are moral duties, not just economic calculations.

But to what extent should this be the responsibility of government? As I said, the family predates society, so government may be useful or harmful to families, but stable families are indispensable to government and society. We literally cannot exist as a state without them, and not only because it would cost too much. Governments must seek to support the intermediate institutions, which are the only way of delivering effective family support at the local level. Those bodies and groups which sit between the family or the individual and the state have, for much of history, done the heavy lifting and care for one another’s well-being and promoting the flourishing of society. All our commissions made recommendations to the Church and for other bodies in society, not simply to government—and that applies to this one.

William Beveridge, often referred to as the father of the welfare state, saw the importance of voluntary institutions. In his 1942 report, where he identified the five giants to be conquered, he wrote:

“The State in organising security should not stifle incentive, opportunity, responsibility; in establishing a national minimum, it should leave room and encouragement for voluntary action by each individual to provide more than that minimum for himself and his family”.

In 1948, Beveridge wrote in his less remembered and much ignored follow-up, Voluntary Action—it is gendered language, but this is 1948—

“how much all men owe to Voluntary Action for public purposes in the past”,

and suggested how it

“can be kept vigorous and abundant in the future”.

There is a crucial role for individuals, churches, and other charities and institutions to play in putting families first. The ideal is for the state to act in such a way as to create a positive reinforcing loop—a force multiplier—with the actions of individuals, intermediate institutions and families themselves, to make space for families, neighbours and communities to care for one another.

In this final bit of the speech, I will focus on two areas where the Government, through their legislation, regulations and example, can promote the flourishing of families and households. The first is ensuring that, whenever a policy is created in any government department, its impact on families and households is considered and acted upon. Does it enable the bonds of love within the family and the household to flourish? Does it support and strengthen relationships?

This week, we hear that many people in this country will be prevented from living together with their spouse, children or elderly parents as a result of a big increase in the minimum income requirement for family visas. The Government are rightly concerned with bringing down the legal migration figures—noble Lords will be relieved to know that I am not going into the politics of that—but there is a cost to be paid in the negative impact that this will have on marriage and family relationships for those who live and work and contribute to our lives together, particularly in social care.

The family test already exists. It was introduced by the Government of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, in 2014. It seeks, through five questions, to introduce a family and household perspective into the policy-making process of every department. I know that DWP— I suspect that the Minister will comment on this—is currently conducting an internal review to look at ways to strengthen the test. That is welcome. The family test should be on the front of every Bill. It should have practical implications for policy, from Treasury spending decisions to the impact of sentencing in the criminal justice system, on which I look forward to hearing more from my right reverend friend the Bishop of Gloucester.

The main thing I urge of the Government is to consider giving the family test, with the support of the Opposition, greater teeth to support its implementation across government departments. Will they require completion and publication of the assessments to increase transparency and learning across government? Will they also consider reviewing the questions asked within the test to focus more on children and all aspects of well-being—emotional, social, spiritual and material? Let me remind noble Lords what I said a few minutes ago. The state is useful to the family, but the family is indispensable to the state. A lack of strong families undermines our whole society. The Government need families to work. They must not set a series of hurdles for them to jump over.

Another key consideration for policy is whether it is family-proof. Is it flexible enough to accommodate the different ways in which families live? One example is the two-child limit on benefits. I pay tribute to the tireless work of my right reverend friend the Bishop of Durham for his campaigning in this area. The End Child Poverty campaign estimates that removing the two-child limit would lift a quarter of a million children out of poverty. The moral case is beyond any question, yet the unfair penalty applied to additional children affects their educational outcomes, their mental and physical health, and their likelihood to require public support from public services later on. It is not a good policy. Will the Government—and the Opposition, should they become the Government at some point—consider removing the two-child limit and addressing other systems and policy choices which keep families in poverty?

Finally—I am conscious of the time—I turn to supporting families, housing and social care. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s recent report on destitution revealed that around 3.8 million people experienced destitution—the total absence of resources, not just poverty—including around 1 million children, in 2022. That is two and a half times the number in 2017 and triple the number of children. Our social security system, designed by Beveridge to reach everyone, is simply staggering under the burden of trying to meet the needs. The situation is grave, especially for those who are disabled. In addition, our housing commission highlighted a chronic shortage of social and affordable housing. Good housing—sustainable, safe, stable, sociable and satisfying—is necessary. This integrates in supporting families. The Reimagining Care Commission called for a national care governor to clarify the responsibilities of everyone—government and others—in care and support.

Putting families first requires a long-term approach. I urge all parties, as we move towards an election year, to place flourishing families and households as a key objective within their manifestoes at the next election and to recognise their responsibility and self-interest for the well-being of adults and children alike and for transforming the way our society operates. Herbert’s famous poem, “Love bade me welcome”, speaks of the sacrificial love of Christ, who welcomed him in when he did not deserve it. Flourishing families are the place where we experience similar love and welcome. Love matters, families matter and relationships matter. I urge us all to seek ways to support their flourishing. I beg to move.

My Lords, it is a great privilege to follow the most reverend Primate. I congratulate him on a very powerful speech. I agree with much of what he said, especially his statement that family is indispensable to the state. In fact, when I saw the subject of his debate this year, I was particularly pleased, because nothing matters more to me than family.

But I have to confess that my heart sank a little when I read the Love Matters report, interesting as it is. I was pleased, as a single person myself, to see the status of “single” being included in the report. I look forward to the speech of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, who will speak about single status. I do not know whether it was meant to make me laugh, but it amused me that, in the bit of the report about single status, Jesus was held up as a great example of a single person. I thought, “Well, if it’s good enough for Jesus, it’s good enough for me”.

But, in a report from the Church of England about love and families, I had expected to find marriage front and centre. It is in there, but is not, for example, mentioned in the key messages or the key priorities for action. I was surprised; I do not think that the most reverend Primate mentioned marriage in his speech. We all understand how important it is not to discriminate or judge families that take different forms; the most reverend Primate reminded us of his own. Relationships do break down irretrievably. It is right that women, for whatever reason, can choose whether to marry the father of their child. Like women, men too can find themselves bringing up children alone, through no fault of their own. In all these situations, there are fantastic parents whose children grow up to be fantastic adults. Nobody disputes that.

Even so, we ought to be able to say—and I think the Church of England should say—that marriage is, none the less, the most secure and optimum arrangement for couples who want to commit to each other, especially if they want to bring up a family and create the best chances for their children to succeed. I find it hard to understand why it does not. Even though the take-up of marriage in the UK has halved since 1990, the benefits of being married are clearly evident to high-income couples, as 83% of us choose to do it, yet we seem happy to ignore the fact that 45% of low-income couples do not choose all the benefits of marriage that we enjoy.

My Lords, thanks are due to the Archbishops and their commission for producing this report. Drawing on a wide range of knowledge and experience, it provides a good basis for discussion of these important issues. I particularly welcome the speech by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury in stressing the importance of a partnership between families and the state. People have suggested that the family is everything and the state is a subsidiary part, but it is a partnership between the two. Quite rightly, the most reverend Primate stressed the role of the state in relation to the family, and I very much welcome that.

I thought it would be helpful for a committed atheist to contribute to this debate, if only to emphasise that believers do not have a monopoly on recognising the needs of families and individuals within society. I am going to avoid the theology, look at the practical proposals and make a number of comments where I think there is more work to be done.

First, I often have a problem with the use of the term “family” in this and similar discussions. Its use is particularly questionable in political discussions where it is often used as a way of dividing rather than uniting. Whenever it is used, we must ask ourselves what counts as a family. At least in the report, the particularly suspect term “hard-working families”, which is too often used when discussing social policies, does not appear. In awful truth, it is sometimes used in a form of dog-whistle politics suggesting that there is the other, the deserving and the undeserving poor, or us and them.

However, if the term “family” is to be defined as including everyone, it loses all meaning. Who is being excluded when we use the word “family”? I am therefore pleased and give tribute that, obviously, care and attention has been taken in drafting this report to avoid this trap. I assume this is deliberate, as the report notes:

My Lords, I am pleased to rise broadly to support what I consider to be the main thrust of the report commissioned by the most reverend Primates. I am not a good sleeper. Last week, I was awake at 3.30 am and decided to grab the iPad and read Love Matters. My first thought, if I am being honest, is that it sounded like the title of a book your parents might hide in their bedroom. I also hoped it would be a cure for insomnia, but how wrong I was on both counts. I found it to be a lucid, challenging and compelling read—I was still there at 6 am. From the most reverend Primates’ foreword onwards, it was quietly explosive. It was not that it was saying things that we did not know; in fact, that was perhaps a disappointment. The facts and data in all the chapters are known to us. I am sure there are clearly some omissions, as noble Lords will point out, but the report made a readable narrative of those facts. It was not the interpretation of the facts because they too are also known to us—for example, that poor housing leads to poor outcomes, to name but one. It was the fact that we were challenged to look at the solutions to those known facts as problems through what I call the love lens.

The definition of love as explained by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury within the biblical and religious context is used a lot in the report, which makes it very different from any normal public policy document. Its fundamental tenet is that families matter, relationships matter and love matters if individuals are to flourish, and I agree. It explains and expands the concept of “family-ness” support. It completely rewrites the definition of “family”, which some would and have taken issue with, and yet we would all surely recognise that love and meaningful relationships come in many different guises and that all are valid and valuable, but it is important to remember that it is still obviously pretty controversial.

My Lords, I am very sad not to continue with the suggestion of “Coronation Street”. I congratulate the Archbishop’s commission on its brave report. It is very welcome. It chimes with much work that I have done over many years. I found it very difficult, when looking through the report, to decide which of its many subjects to say something about today, but I shall pick up on children, building a fairer society and dysfunctional families. It is no wonder that I chose dysfunctional families, because I was a family judge, so nearly all my work has dealt with dysfunctional families or oligarchs hiding their money so they did not have to pay their wives.

In 1987-88 I chaired the Cleveland inquiry on child abuse. One of its recommendations was that the child is a person, not an object of concern. I add, having heard for years since then how so many children are treated, that children are absolutely not packages.

I am impressed by this report’s emphasis on children, particularly on listening to children and young people and taking seriously what they have to say. Unusually, perhaps, children used to come and see me in my room, and I found that quite young children gave me astonishingly accurate reports of what they were concerned about and how they thought I, as a judge, might be able to put it right. I have seen a great many videos made by child psychiatrists and social workers with children as young as five or six giving an entirely accurate account of what has happened. I have to say that many times I preferred to hear that from a six year-old than from a 15 year-old, who might well have an agenda.

I do not underestimate the information that children can give. It is crucial to listen to them and take them seriously. We should not necessarily agree with what they have said or do what they want, but we must give them a chance, as the report underlines, to play their part in what goes on. I add that it is important to recognise child trauma, and the lack of sufficient facilities to deal with it.

My Lords, I thank the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury for holding this debate on a matter that is foundational to not only the well-being of us as individuals but the whole of society. I should obviously declare my interest as co-chair of the commission that produced the report. I also thank him for the privilege of being asked to co-chair it, alongside Professor Janet Walker. It was an honour to work with her and the 10 other commission members in listening and speaking to children, young people and adults from all faiths and all walks of life.

I thank each of the commission members, who generously gave their time and expertise voluntarily to contribute to this. Their work has been invaluable. I also pay tribute to the Children’s Commissioner for England for the way in which she shared with us her work, which took place in parallel. Our conclusions are remarkably similar.

My most reverend friend the Archbishop of Canterbury opened the debate by speaking poignantly on the importance of family. I will speak on what is at the very heart of families, which is relationships. Throughout the commission, we met and spoke with people from across the country. They were people from different backgrounds, ages, cultures and faiths. Despite these differences, there was a theme that echoed throughout all our conversations: the importance of family and loving relationships.

For an individual and family to flourish, each person must have their basic needs met—water, food, clothing, enough money to live on and a roof over their head—but true flourishing comes from loving relationships. It is through these relationships that we find support, connectedness and belonging. Families today come in all shapes, sizes and structures, but the commission found that what matters most is the quality of the relationships and love that we receive and give. We are made for loving relationships—to love and be loved.

My Lords, the standard set in 1 Corinthians is a high standard for some of us to meet. I have been married for only 56 years to the same person—not as good as the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss. I think our marriage survives only because we are in separate Houses; he is the Father of the House of Commons, and I am here.

Quite often, I have referred to a comment to me by the late Dukey Hussey, who was in this House. He said, “Murder, frequently; divorce, never!” Within that context, I endorse the comments from my noble friend Lady Stowell that marriage gives an additional piece of glue holding people together: a coalition. I might have gone off him quite often, but we are married and therefore it is obligatory. I urge noble Lords to say that there is a role for marriage, but it has to be handled sensitively and appropriately.

I speak also as somebody who worked in a child guidance clinic as a psychiatric social worker. I was on the board of the Children’s Society and, of course, I was the Minister responsible for implementing the seminal Children Act 1989, which has stood the test of time. I remember so well the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and her inquiry. Having previously been a juvenile court chairman, I was so aware of the issues involved. The difficulty with children is that something can be true, but it can be fantasy. Taking children away wrongly is a terrible thing to do; leaving children in their homes and disaster ensuing is a terrible thing to happen. Very few understand the complexity of these decisions.

I am a committed Anglican. I was a lay canon at Guildford Cathedral. However, like the Church of England, the Conservative Party I joined was one where no one was ever so vulgar as to ask what you really believed. I own my own beliefs and faith; they are not imposed. I am not sure how well I would do at an examination if asked exactly what I believed—either by the Tory party or by the Church of England. However, I am totally committed to the Church of England as it is.

My Lords, I welcome this report and I particularly welcome the Church basing a report on something from scriptures. Far be it from me to ever advise anyone in the Church on the structure of the Church, but over the years I have been baffled over how much time the Church has been deflected into issues that do not appear to feature very much in the Bible—yet here we have a report that uses a thematic, a concept, a word, that is embedded in the theology at every level, not quite in every verse but in every chapter, one might say, and I commend it on that.

I have not done any early morning revision, but I do not recall the word “divorce” featuring in the scriptures; perhaps it does and I am mistaken. I am advised that it does once. Well, there is a good balance, then, in terms of where the balance of work should be. I want to talk about separation, but a separation in terms of distance that I think is crucial to how this commendable report could assist in policy-making. Perhaps this could have been stressed more within the report, but if one compares with other faith groups—Judaism, the Muslim faith, Hindus, Sikhism—one sees strong family structures. Without question, the whole concept of faith is a key bind, but I think there is something more practical that we, as those attempting to advise and influence policy-making and decision-making by the state, could understand from the comparator, and that is to do with distance or non-distance.

What defines all those communities is that, geographically, they are rather compact. The housing that people live in is very near. That is a fundamental issue in relation to family. I have written down the term “dysfunctional families”. There is no more dysfunctional family than the one whose son’s birth will be celebrated in a week or two: a family that did not have stable housing. Availability of housing stock, it seems to me, is the single most fundamental issue in relation to family. I have been married for 37 years —I am almost beginning to lose count—and I do not fetishise the concept of marriage, but the concept of family I absolutely do, which is why I think this report is so helpful.