A move to fundamentally change the working conditions and rights of Anglican clergy has been approved by the British Parliament.The measure, which had been agreed by General Synod, has taken six years to prepare.
It aims to set out more clearly the rights and responsibilities of clergy and paid lay ministers and provide greater protection and accountability for clergy.
Introducing the proposals to the House of Lords, the Bishop of Chelmsford, John Gladwin, said the “evolution of patterns of ministry over many centuries has created the potential for inequitable differences of treatment”.
He said: “This measure is vital to the future health of the church. It is an opportunity to make a new covenant between people and their clergy that is fit for the 21st century and enshrines essential principles of fairness, clarity and collaboration.”
Peers accepted the Ecclesiastical Offices (Terms of Service) Measure without a vote after MPs had earlier approved them by 362 votes to 21. Opponents in the Commons were made up of 20 Tory MPs and Labour’s Dennis Skinner. The measure subsequently obtained royal assent.
The new conditions of service – called common tenure -- are ultimately intended to apply to all clergy and stipendiary lay ministers from the Archbishop of Canterbury downwards.
Bishop Gladwin told peers that clergy are “officeholders, not employees” and those that have the “freehold” are “very secure”.
But he added: “Clergy with a freehold are now in the minority. Other clergy, including many with full responsibility for parishes, are licensed to their offices by the bishop, and their security of tenure is very limited, since the bishop has the power to revoke their licences, either summarily or on reasonable notice.”
“Common tenure seeks above all to promote justice and fairness. For the first time, it gives clergy the great majority of rights enjoyed by employees, including the right to a stipend and to annual leave.
“At the same time, it preserves and protects their status as officeholders, which reflects the way in which their ministry is best exercised.”
“With a view to enhancing the security of clergy who do not enjoy the freehold, the measure removes the bishop’s power to terminate a licence summarily, and closely defines the circumstances in which an office can be terminated.”
He said the changes also “ensure that clergy are properly accountable both to their congregations and to the wider church”.
Bishop Gladwin added: “Accountability will be strengthened through the introduction of a capability procedure, which enables bishops to address, through a fair and transparent process, the problems that arise when clergy fail, for whatever reason, to perform their duties to an acceptable standard.
“This procedure is designed to be supportive, and to give clergy the time, training and resources that they need to improve. If in the last resort an officeholder is removed under this procedure, he or she will have the right to bring a claim of unfair dismissal to an employment tribunal.”
Lord Lloyd of Berwick, a former Law Lord who chairs the parliamentary Ecclesiastical Committee, said he was in favour of retaining the clergy freehold.
But he told peers the committee had accepted the reform because it would “establish a clear, consistent and transparent framework for the terms of service of the clergy as a whole and will give many clergy, for the first time, substantial employment-type rights”.
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(Source: RI)