Queen’s Speech

Lord Bishop of Oxford Excerpts

Tuesday 15th May 2012 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford]

My Lords, there are two aspects of the gracious Speech that I would like to comment on with regard to education. One is the proposal to improve provision for children with special educational needs. I am very pleased to have heard the announcement today on that subject. There is great need for reform in that area. As the Green Paper so eloquently demonstrated, it is a cumbersome system and does not deliver the individualised support that young people need and that schools and colleges want to give.

Wonderful work goes on, of course. I was in a church school in my diocese the other week where they teach and look after a child with, I am told, the most extreme special needs of any child in the county. He has two full-time carers. What impressed me was not only the quality of that care but the way that the teachers spoke about receiving a lot more than they give in looking after that special eight year-old. As we know, a society is judged by the way it values its most vulnerable members.

Today’s announcement will have widespread support. There is a real opportunity to make a difference to the lives and opportunities of many children and young people with additional needs. Many noble Lords will have experience of children with special needs in schools. I ask the Government also to remember the 300,000 learners in FE, sixth forms and apprenticeships who have learning difficulties. More than half of them have support costs of no more than £2,500, so a modest investment can make a real difference.

I also support the intention to simplify the assessment process. It is at present too bureaucratic and too disjointed. We need integrated budgets between health, education and skills, social care and the Department for Work and Pensions. The new children and families Bill is eagerly awaited.

My other point is about higher education, which is of course vital to our national life, educating about 45% of our 17 to 30 year-olds. Massive changes are going on. We have had the trebling of tuition fees, a new and untested core and margin method of recruitment, a changed funding system with money following the student and no central funding for the arts and humanities—and lots more happening. Those are far-reaching changes, but there is no mention of higher education in the gracious Speech. The once anticipated higher education Bill is nowhere in sight.

Last June, the White Paper, Students at the Heart of the System, was published. I was very pleased to see the commitment to widening participation, constant improvement in the quality of teaching and the importance of the student experience—all very good things. I remain uneasy about one fundamental point which I detect in the changes. That is a view of higher education in many ways alien to the tradition of, for example, Humboldt, Newman, Robbins or Dearing. Put simply, it is an instrumentalist view. Universities are there to serve the economy. Students are to go to university to help them get jobs. Those are important matters, but that is a disappointingly narrow approach to what education is about at its most transformational. There is nothing about the excitement of learning, nothing about feeding the human spirit, nothing about a community of learning at the heart of society, nothing about the university as a place where society can reflect on its values and goals.

The Diocese of Oxford has seven universities within it, somewhat surprisingly. I can name six of them but I always forget the seventh. I look to them not only to serve the economy—they must do that—but to help the country to think, to reflect and to be self-critical in the right sense. In the Times Higher on 1 March, David Willetts said that the higher education White Paper initially had a chapter on the value of the university and its wider purpose, but it got cut out. A sight of this lost gospel would be most helpful.

There are massive changes going on in higher education, yet no mention of it in the gracious Speech and no suggestion that Parliament might review the impact of the current changes in, say, a year’s time. Nor has the Government’s response to the consultation on last year’s White Paper been made public. Is the House to be denied the opportunity to debate what is happening in our universities?

Crime: Metal Thieves

Lord Bishop of Oxford Excerpts

Thursday 15th December 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is quite right to raise the issue of the threat to life. Already this year, I think that some six criminals have been killed stealing metal—it is perhaps a higher figure—but in stealing that metal they have caused considerable disruption to power supplies and other things. We know that that has affected not only hospitals but, on other occasions, the emergency services. That is why the Government certainly feel it necessary that we must make moves in the area.

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford]

My Lords, the call for tighter regulation of scrap yards, including cashless transactions, is widespread. We know that the industry itself wants to back regulation. I wonder whether the Minister could be a bit more specific on the timescale and when we might expect some real reform of the regulations, including particularly the easy access to cash which supports something causing not only the damage of yesterday that we have heard about but damage in our own case. We have around 10 churches a day losing their roofs. Can we have a timescale?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, the right reverend Prelate is right to draw attention to the problems that the churches are facing. I recently met his colleague, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London, to discuss this issue. He is also right to draw attention to the fact that the industry itself recognises the need for more regulation in this field, which is why we want to go down that route. However, although the industry recognises the need for more regulation, it does not see the advantages of going cashless. I think that going cashless would possibly be the biggest gain to make.

Marriages and Civil Partnerships (Approved Premises) (Amendment) Regulations 2011

Lord Bishop of Oxford Excerpts

Thursday 15th December 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

My unequivocal view, which I have been trying to express, though rather badly, is that the provision that the noble Lord, Lord Alli, and I have quoted has the effect of making sure that no discrimination proceedings can be brought under the Equality Act or under the convention in English law as a result of a church saying no to civil partnerships being solemnised on their premises. That is the problem and I am absolutely clear that there is no possibility of discrimination legislation, based on the Equality Act, as a result of the drafting of Section 202.

There is also a broader point of principle. We should not, as a House, be knocked off doing what we decided to do by the opinions of two Queen’s Counsels. We should be clear that we achieved our intention. We used simple language. There is no doubt about what it means and I have absolutely no doubt that the courts will give it effect. I have reason to believe that it might be said that it would be quite easy to amend the provisions, using a provision of the Civil Partnerships Act under Section 259. This would take time, but it would be quite easy to do. It is, however, utterly unnecessary because we expressed our views utterly clearly and the courts will give effect to them.

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford]

My Lords, I, too, am most grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, for an extraordinarily erudite narrative. I am also grateful to the noble Baroness for initiating the debate because it gives us the opportunity to look at this very important and sensitive issue of the regulations. I have been much exercised, as I am sure many of you have, by the conflicting opinions I have received. I very much wish the issue were clear-cut, and perhaps it really is. However, for reasons I will explain, I will not be able to join the noble Baroness in the Division Lobbies if she pushes it to a vote.

I say that with real regret, because I entirely share the noble Baroness’s passionate concern for safeguarding religious liberty which is one of the tap-roots for all liberty. Those who hold to the traditional ethical teaching on sexual morality of the Christian churches and many other faiths can too easily be accused of being homophobes. The implication is that, if persuasion does not work, we may have to resort to coercion, which would be a profoundly wrong approach.

The question before us today is whether these regulations do in fact interfere with religious freedom. Having considered the issues carefully and tried my best to understand the conflicting legal opinions of the distinguished lawyers with whom I have also been in touch, I am not persuaded that they do give us that danger. There could, in principle, be two possible arguments for opposing the regulations. The first would be to register opposition to the principle of allowing civil partnerships to be registered in places of worship. The second would be because, although the principle is accepted, these particular regulations were deficient.

On the first point, although it is history, it can be argued that the change in the law agreed by Parliament last year does have its curious features. To say, as the law now does, that civil partnerships can be registered in places of worship but without any religious element taking place in the registration is, on the face of it, quite odd. Moreover, denominations wishing to offer services of blessing following civil registration can already invite people to come to the church or synagogue after the registration and have that element there. Parliament rehearsed these arguments last year and was persuaded that, if people want to register their civil partnership and have a religious ceremony at the same time and in the same location, then legislation should not get in the way of their doing so. That was essentially for religious liberty reasons. The Quakers, the liberal Jews, the Unitarians and anyone else who wanted to host civil partnership registrations should be free to do so, but not forced to do so. I do not, therefore, see a sufficient case for opposing these regulations on the first of those two possible grounds.

For me and, I am sure, for all of us here, everything turns on the second issue which is whether these regulations and, indeed, the Equality Act to which they give effect, are defective. By defective, I mean whether what is meant to be an option would, in fact, become a duty. Will churches and chapels be at risk of litigation? We non-lawyers are in the hands of the experts here. I can muster only a 40 year-old Oxford law degree which is quite inadequate for the task. However, the advice of the legal office of the General Synod is clear that it will be perfectly lawful for churches, chapels and other places of worship to decline to register their places of worship as premises for civil partnerships. That advice has been unequivocally endorsed by the standing counsel to the Synod, Sir Anthony Hammond QC, who was previously Her Majesty’s Procurator General and Treasury Solicitor and Queen’s Proctor. It is also the view of the Government’s lawyers and other senior lawyers not unknown in these erudite precincts, one of whom we have just heard from.

In addition, for the Church of England and certain other denominations, there would have to be a policy decision at the national level from the relevant body—in our case the General Synod—before any church could seek to register. I know that the Christian Institute has commissioned legal opinion from the two separate QCs we have heard about, who take a different view to the lawyers I have mentioned. This is disturbing, and I look to the Minister in responding to this debate to read very carefully into the record his own understanding of the position. In particular, I would like to hear him assure the House that, in the wholly unexpected event of the courts taking a different view from the massed ranks of government lawyers, church lawyers and other lawyers to whom I have referred, we would have either primary or secondary legislation to sort the problem out. I am sure that assurance can be given.

I have the highest regard for the professionalism and integrity of the lawyers of the General Synod, who also advise the House of Bishops. In the light of their advice, it is not clear that there is anything in these regulations or last year’s legislation which needs to be changed. They appear to me to preserve the ability of the Church of England and all other churches and faiths to decide their policy on these matters in the light of their own beliefs and teaching. I regret coming to a different conclusion from the noble Baroness; I would like to have stood with her in support of religious liberty, which is essential to a civilised society, but on the balance of arguments I believe the safeguards are already in place.

Let me say one final word before I conclude. It is hardly a secret that the Church of England along with many other religious traditions continues to wrestle with the underlying ethical issues. We are likely to go on doing so for a considerable time. I have taken part in many of those internal debates and they are at their best when characterised by a spirit of restraint, mutual respect and generosity.

Given the litigious nature of our society, it is only right that we should look at regulations on a sensitive subject such as this with a good deal of care. I am grateful that so many noble Lords and noble Baronesses are here to do that. Nevertheless, I would urge from these Benches that this debate is characterised by that same restraint, mutual respect and generosity that I just mentioned. Those are the qualities by which religious, and indeed all, liberties are best nourished and protected.

Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Bill

Lord Bishop of Oxford Excerpts

Wednesday 5th October 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Oxford]

My Lords, the Church of England is sometimes accused of being unclear or indecisive in its public pronouncements, so it is worth noting that on 14 February 2008 the General Synod voted by 235 votes to two for a motion that expressed its grave concern that the proposal to extend the maximum period of pre-charge detention of terrorist suspects from 28 to 42 days would “unacceptably disturb the balance” between individual liberty and national security. The motion went on to call on the Government to review the restrictions and obligations imposed on individuals under the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 and the use of undisclosed material in control order proceedings. I therefore welcome the order that will shortly be placed before your Lordships and the fact that the Government have produced the Bill as a result of their review of the control order system.

We are all indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, for the review of counterterrorism and security powers. As Director of Public Prosecutions in 2008, his clarity and level-headedness were a great help to many of us who were non-experts as we tried to sort the wheat from the chaff over 42 days. Those qualities have also informed his conduct in the review.

It is increasingly clear from the debates that have followed the report of the Newton committee and the Lords judgments on detaining foreign nationals under the Special Immigration Appeals Commission that control orders were an attempt to solve a very difficult, if not insoluble, problem; that is, what to do about people who are suspected of terrorist activity but can be neither deported nor prosecuted. Therefore, I sympathise with successive Governments as they have struggled with this issue, which is rather like trying to square a circle. In these circumstances, it is very difficult to find a way forward that satisfies both the needs of national security and public safety and the rights of individuals under the rule of law.

The central objection to control orders was that they restricted the liberty of suspects without due process of law. However, it is hard to see how the prediction of the future behaviour of terrorist suspects could ever be subject to legal action in the way that past conduct could be. The judgment that the liberty of individuals needs to be restricted because there is well founded intelligence that they pose a threat to national security is essentially an executive decision. How far that can be subject to any normal effective judicial review is a difficult issue.

On the other side, if there is a system of restrictions, it needs to be as limited as possible and subject to legal safeguards that are as robust as they can be made. This, I take it, is the Government’s intention in the Bill. It is all very well to dismiss TPIMs as “control orders light” but, unless they have found a viable alternative to dealing with the problem, light is better than heavy, provided that the measures are likely to achieve their objectives.

I welcome the clarity of the conditions on the imposition of measures set out in Clause 3, although I leave it to the lawyers to argue whether reasonable belief is a higher threshold than reasonable suspicion of terrorism-related activity. The defined list of powers is preferable to the non-exhaustive list of obligations in the 2005 Act. It is good that the possibility of imposing derogating orders has gone, along with the requirement for relocation, although I understand the points well made by noble Lords earlier. I also welcome the two-year limit for TPIM notices. Taken together, these provisions go a long way to alleviating many of the most objectionable features of the control order regime.

The other outstanding issue is the nature of the judicial process adopted. The use of closed hearings, non-disclosure of evidence to suspects and the employment of special advocates all raise serious issues about the right to a fair trial, which is guaranteed under Article 6 of the European convention. I am reassured that the Home Office has taken note of the House of Lords decision in the case of AF by suggesting in its European Convention on Human Rights memorandum that suspects will,

“be given sufficient information about the allegations against them to enable them to give effective instructions in relation to those allegations”.

Whether and how far this will be feasible remains to be seen.

Finally, it is important that the Bill links prevention and investigation. Under the old regime, there was a worry that control orders were being used as a substitute for investigation and prosecution. Now it is clear that the two can be carried on in tandem, and that underlines the fact that prosecution and conviction is the preferred option and that TPIMs are very much a second-best resort for a small number of suspects. Although in an ideal world I would prefer not to have any such measures, I accept that in the circumstances we now face they are both necessary and proportionate, and I am content to support the Bill.