A fund set up in response to the disaster that took
place on 11 September last year at the Gleision drift mine at
Cilybebyll, near Swansea (
News, 23 September 2011), has now been wound up. Almost £1.1
million has been distributed to dependants of the four
miners.
Dr Rowan Williams has been invited to address a future meeting
of the GB, "when he has left Canter-bury and is able to speak his
mind in the way we have always valued", the chairman of the
Standing Committee, Judge Philip Price, said.
An attempt to remove the upper age limit for membership
of various bodies and posts, including those of churchwardens, was
rejected by the GB. Moving a private member's motion, Dr David
Causton (St Davids) said: "An older person may be wiser than
when they were younger."
Lord Rowe-Beddoe, who is shortly to retire as
chairman of the Representative Body after reaching the mandatory
retirement age, said that the mandatory age "flies in the face of
all equality legislation, and wouldn't stand a chance if it was
challenged". He favoured fixed-term appointments, he said. "If a
CEO is in post for less than five years, they were the wrong
person. If they are in post for more than ten years, then they were
definitely the wrong person."
The motion was lost, with 57 against, 39 for, and 23
abstentions.