THE General Synod took the unexpected step of moving to next business after a contentious debate on Monday on the Legal Officers (Annual Fees) Order 2024, which determines the annual retainer of Diocesan Registrars.
The business had come under the deemed-items section of the agenda, for debate only if requested. The Archdeacon of Sunderland, the Ven. Robert Cooper (Durham), who chairs the Fees Advisory Commission (FAC), which recommends the rate, acknowledged concerns about the level of the pay increase, at close to 25 per cent. The formula aimed to remunerate registrars for 75 per cent of what they did, he said; so they were “very far from being overpaid”. The FAC considered the retainer provided to be very good value for money.
Registrars provided a high-quality service, he said, and, without a retainer, dioceses would have to agree the fee for each piece of work at the prevailing hourly rate. There was evidence of the increasing difficulty in recruitment of the next generation of ecclesiastical lawyers. The order was “intended to balance the needs of registrars with those of the diocese”.
Canon Joyce Jones (Leeds) agreed about the importance of having ecclesiastical lawyers and paying them properly. “But a 25-per-cent increase does seem to be excessive,” she said. “I support the principle, but the way the formula is working needs to be renewed.”
The Revd James Pitkin (Winchester), on Zoom, attributed the increase to the outworking of the complex formula used to set the fees. “But the result seems ridiculous,” he said. “It has come without warning or consultation with the DBFs. Budgets at diocesan level now can’t be changed to accommodate this huge increase. It would be good to say no.”
Carl Hughes (Archbishops’ Council) said that the increase would raise the total retainers paid by £1.1 million: 58 per cent would be paid by the dioceses and the remainder by the Commissioners. The quantum of the increase was “not that huge”, he suggested: the retainer gave dioceses certainty of the costs they faced, and, even with the increase, would provide better value for money than the pay-as-you-go system. “We need to ensure this specialistic ecclesiastical law remains attractive for law firms.”
The Dean of the Arches and Auditor, the Rt Worshipful Morag Ellis KC, said that, compared with commercial rates, these rates were actually low. Pragmatically, registrars were part of solicitors’ firms, and recruitment into this very niche ecclesiastical world was difficult. She advised the Synod to endorse the principle of fair remuneration.
Carl Fender (Lincoln), a member of the FAC, said that it had been mindful of the impact that the increase would have on dioceses. “We need to adequately resource specialist services,” he said, suggesting that one of the effects of an underfunded system would be that less-qualified people did the work.
The Dean of St Edmundsbury, the Very Revd Joe Hawes, was concerned about consultation. Further, he had seen no evidence of the difficulty of recruiting solicitors to the role.
Julie Dziegiel (Oxford) was outraged at the scale of the increase. “I’m very sorry, but this does have an effect on the squeezed middle budgets of the dioceses,” she said. “It’s unacceptable.”
The Revd Dr Sara Batts-Neale (Chelmsford) described the large amount of legal work and low levels of staffing in her diocese, which was so large that she said that it should be considered for London weighting.
Aiden Hargreaves-Smith (London) brought a procedural motion to move to next business. A registrar himself, he thanked the Commission for its wider work, but was concerned that the increase could cause difficulties in relationships between dioceses and registrars, which, he said, were fundamental. “It won’t help us to continue this conversation,” he said.
“Without rejecting the principles of the annual fees order, in a classic via media, let’s ask the FAC to bring a different proposal back to Synod. We do need to avoid returning to a situation where recruiting is a major challenge.”
There was a theme there about “how much we love our registrars and value what they offer”, the Archdeacon said in response: “I’m happy to move to next business so that the FAC can give further consideration to it, and bring a further proposal to Synod in February.”
The motion was carried by a show of hands.
On Tuesday, the Synod approved by a show of hands the Ecclesiastical Legal Officers, Judges and Others (Fees) Order 2024, which makes provision for the variety of fees payable to the above in respect of proceedings such as Faculty hearings.
The rise was seven per cent, based on recommendations from the Senior Salaries Review Board, and was uncontroversial. The Archdeacon of London, the Ven. Luke Miller (London), referred to the “complexity of stuff we have to deal with in keeping the engine room of the Church running. There is a concomitant cost to that,” he said.