Succession to the Crown Bill

Lord James of Blackheath Excerpts

Thursday 28th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Fellowes]

My Lords, I, too, much regret that I was unavoidably prevented from attending Second Reading but I hope that I may none the less speak briefly to this amendment.

First, I support the Bill wholeheartedly. Furthermore, I understand and agree with the motives behind the amendment. Both the Bill and the amendment are timely and necessary. I fear, however, that I cannot support the amendment as drafted. More clarity and public commitment from the Roman Catholic Church on the subject of the upbringing of an heir to the Throne would indeed be most welcome, but I think that that desired outcome would be more likely to be achieved by quiet negotiation than by ultimatum. The amendment has a ring of ultimatum about it, at least to me. For that reason I cannot give it my support. None the less, I hope that we can find a satisfactory form of words that carries perhaps less threat and more promise, both to the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church.

[Lord James of Blackheath]

The noble Lords, Lord Forsyth and Lord Deben, have both got very close to being the first Peers in this debate to mention that here we are addressing the concern of whether we can alter the Bill of Rights. Sooner or later, that issue will have to be debated in much more detail than allowed for by today’s agenda.

I have one technical question for the noble Lord, Lord Cormack: does he believe that the papacy is able to commit its successors any more than, as he no doubt believes, one Parliament can commit another?

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, this has been a very good debate and, has just been mentioned, will inform a number of the amendments that we are due to discuss. Maybe we will be able to move a little faster as a result.

The amendment, in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Freeman and Lord Cormack, makes abolition of the Catholic marriage ban conditional on an agreement with the Vatican that children of such marriages should be brought up as Anglicans. As for preserving the Protestant succession, the amendment is unnecessary because under the present rules no Catholic will be able to succeed. As we have heard, it seems highly unlikely that the Vatican is in any position to make children of mixed marriages be brought up as Anglicans, should we require it to. In any case, we understand that this is a matter already delegated to the Catholic hierarchy in the UK.

However, as several noble Lords have suggested, this issue raises the question of whether any religious test should be preserved as one of the rules for succession. As we will hear from the noble and learned Lord, that will perhaps be a matter for another time, but I will come back to it in later amendments.