DEBATE on the approval of the Church Representation Rules
(Amendment) [(No. 1)] Resolution 2014, which had been adjourned in
February after the Resolution was amended, resumed on Tuesday
morning.
The original Resolution derived from the proposals for change
from the Archbishop's Council's Simplification Group. The
amendments would have had the effect of, among other things,
reducing the minimum number of PCC meetings required per year to
two; and replacing the requirement of giving notice at or near the
principal door of the church with one about giving notice in such
form as was regarded as likely to enable the electoral-roll members
to discover that the meeting was to be held.
Canon Robert Cotton (Guildford) suggested that
good governance was not achieved by obeying rules, but by
establishing things that the rules point us towards: "Transparency,
taking people with us, making sure there is good understanding,
ethical behaviour." The Measure was an attempt to bring together
the two approaches of gentle legality and bold spirit.
Tim Allen (St Edmundsbury & Ipswich) had
been critical of the legislation put before the Synod in February
as "inadequately prepared". But he would support what was now
before the Synod.
Ian Fletcher (West Yorkshire & the Dales)
said there was uncertainty about which rules would take precedence.
He disagreed with setting a minimum yearly number of PCC meetings.
Better to rely on the good sense of PCCs. He told Synod to reject
and improve the Measure.
The Revd Jonathan
Alderton-Ford (St Edmundsbury & Ipswich) said that it
was "wise" to reduce the number of meetings, but suggested that
people needed space to "protest and ask awkward questions. Some
people are not nice; some PCCs are silly; some are controlling;
some of them are downright nasty."
The rule might be a "guide for wise people and a rod for fools".
Some needed an archdeacon to "come along and give a poke, or people
will become more and more slovenly, and things will go wrong".
There was an issue about Synod's acting in the past as a
watchdog: "If we smell weakness or blood on the platform . . . we
draw blood. That's not a way of doing business. We do need robust
debate, but, in the end, we want to come out of the process whole,
not wounded." On the whole, Synod was now "going in the right
direction".
Peter Haddock (Southwark) was inclined to vote
against because the current Rules had been a "great blessing to us.
I don't think there is enough acceptance and acknowledgement of the
role of the Charity Commission". He warned that "people with very
good intent do run things in very strange ways."
In a vote by Houses, the motion to approve the Resolution was
lost in the Houses of Clergy and Laity, and was lost: Bishops:
13-3-0; Clergy: 65-35-9; Laity: 57-54-6.