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

Debate between Lord Hacking and Lord Cormack

Friday 8th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, it is a very great pleasure to follow the right reverend Prelate’s splendid speech. Housing is fundamental to decent family life and she is right to make those points. I add my congratulations to the most reverend Primate of all England on choosing this debate and the manner in which he introduced it.

It is entirely appropriate to have a Christmas debate focused on the family. Christmas is the season which above all is focused on the most famous family that ever lived. It is a privilege to take part in this debate. I want to choose my words with real care because I so agreed with my noble friend Lady Stowell when she focused on marriage. Like my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Burry Port, I have had a long marriage to a single wife—56 years in my case. What I am even more pleased about is that both of my sons have celebrated their silver wedding anniversaries and one is heading for his 30th next year, which is very good. The family is the fundamental building block of society. Strong marriages make for strong families.

My noble friend Lord Herbert made a powerful and moving speech. He indicated that he respected the views of those who take a different view. While I am proud to have many gay friends whom I like and admire enormously, I hold to the traditional Christian view that marriage is between a man and a woman. Many Christians do not agree with that, and I respect them. Perhaps I am wrong. However, I hold to that view. It is extremely important that we do all what we can within the Christian Church to encourage marriage, because there is a stability in that relationship which is not present in others.

I support what the General Synod decided a couple of weeks ago. I am sorry that the majority was such a narrow one, because I think that it is right that those of the same sex who wish to live together as a permanent couple should have an opportunity for a blessing in a church. I welcome that and support it, and will continue to do so. I have every sympathy with the most reverend Primate, who has, in seeking to lead the Anglican Communion, a very difficult task indeed. He deserves the support and the prayers of us all, because what my noble friend Lord Herbert said about Uganda is, frankly, toe-curling. I do not see how any Christian can give support to a regime that will punish with a death sentence people who follow particular inclinations in their lives. He has my complete support in the hard work that he seeks to do there.

It is appropriate to turn to the role of government. I agree with my noble friend Lord Robathan, who made the point that he was not a supporter of the nanny state—he did not put it in those words. Nor am I, but I think that the Government have a real task to encourage family life and to do all they can, to touch on the point made by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chelmsford, to ensure that there is proper housing available. It is difficult to hold a family together if it has to live in the sort of conditions that the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Burry Port, so movingly described in his speech.

There is another thing that I would like to see government do. I am one of those who believes there is a real virtue in a civil national service for young people who reach the age of 18. After all, if we do not treat our children properly, we are sabotaging our own future. I am not suggesting that it has to be full-time, and it can be in conjunction with university or other studies or occupations, but there is real value in giving, or encouraging in, young people a sense of civic and national pride and patriotism—I use that word deliberately—by obliging them to perform certain tasks of a civil nature. The National Trust encourages this, and it is very good that it should, but it really should be for every young person to have that opportunity, and it should be underwritten by government funding, whichever party is in power.

I am one of those who just escaped national service. I was old enough and had it deferred: in those days, if you went to university, it was virtually automatically deferred until you got your degree. By the time I had graduated in 1960 or 1961, it was all over. I rather regret that, but nevertheless, there we are. There is a great deal to be said for reform of civil national service for our young people. It would chime with many of the recommendations made in this hefty and lengthy report, on which I congratulate the two Archbishops and all those responsible for it. Again, I thank the most reverend Primate for giving us the opportunity to debate this in your Lordships’ House.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I hope the noble Lord will allow me to break in just before he sits down. I did not avoid national service: I did my two years and there is much that he said that is true about it. But, having listened to the whole of this debate, the emphasis surely should not be on marriage. We understand entirely why the noble Lord, Lord Herbert of South Downs, feels so strongly about marriage, but the centre point is the family and the household.