SENIOR Labour Party members reaffirmed the Government’s commitment to involving faith groups in the task of “national renewal”, as Labour opened its first party conference while in power since 2009.

At the conference on Tuesday afternoon, Sir Keir Starmer said that “change must mean nothing less than national renewal.” His government would reject popularism — which he termed “the politics of easy answers” — and he stated his ambition to lead a “mission-led government . . . focused on a long-term plan”.

As the Church Times was going to press, a non-binding vote calling on the Government to reverse recent cuts to winter fuel payments was passed by conference delegates.

Bishops in the House of Lords previously criticised the cuts when they were announced earlier this month (News, 13 September).

On Thursday of last week, before the conference began, the Labour MP for East Ham, Sir Stephen Timms, had expanded on the Government’s “national renewal” slogan, saying that it needed “to be more than just material improvement”.

In addition to “tangible improvement . . . we also need to change the way we think about our country and ourselves, to rebuild our hope for the future”, he said, and argued that “religion and faith groups have a great deal to contribute.”

During the pandemic, faith groups had “stepped up” in several ways, he said, such as the provision of material and emotional support to those in need.

Faith groups also fostered a sense of belonging, he said, and he dismissed concerns that this promoted divisions in society: “Minority faith groups don’t dilute Britishness, but add to it.”

Sir Stephen, a minister in the Department for Work and Pensions, was speaking at a lecture in St Bride’s, Fleet Street, organised by the Religion Media Centre, in which he outlined the Government’s commitment to working with faith groups.

On Sunday, before the party conference began, he attended a service led by the Bishop of Liverpool, Dr John Perumbalath, at St James in the City, in Liverpool, which was attended by MPs, including the outgoing chair of Christians on the Left, Jonathan Reynolds.

The service marked the opening of the conference and was organised by Christians on the Left with Housing Justice and Christians Against Poverty, its co-sponsors.

The director of Christians on the Left, Hannah Rich, said that the service provided a rare opportunity for MPs attending the conference to be “a normal person” and avoid the lobbying that took place much of the rest of the time.

At the start of the service, Dr Perumbalath said: “Our faith in Christ itself is a mandate to work for justice and peace in the world which God so loved. Our political conviction is part of our Christian vocation.”

The Government’s Faith Minister, Lord Khan, also attended. He said that it was “wonderful” to mark the opening of the conference with a church service, and paid tribute to the part played by Christians on the Left in securing Labour’s victory in the General Election.

“As a Muslim, and a member of the Abrahamic family of faiths, I am daily reminded of how much we have in common,” he said. He paid tribute to the “power of faith” evident in ways in which communities responded to the riots in August (News, 9 August).

In his lecture, Sir Stephen paid tribute to Lord Khan, who, he said, had told him that he was “looking forward to working with faith leaders across the country to ensure that faith is at the heart of government, and government harnesses the power of faith”.

On Wednesday morning, Ms Rich said that the Government’s pronouncements of the value of faith groups were “in no way just rhetoric”, and that it would play out at the level of individual MPs’ working in their constituencies as well as at the party level.

Ms Rich drew attention to the Labour Faith Champions project, which Sir Stephen chairs, as an example of the Government’s commitment to engaging with faith communities.

Sir Stephen, who is not an Anglican, said that he was “impressed by a great deal that the Established Church does”, including the contributions of bishops in the House of Lords.

He said that he “hadn’t seen any recent significant proposals” for disestablishment, and that his view was that it was necessary to “make the best of the circumstances that we’re in rather than trying to unpick things”.