The Bishop of Manchester received the following written answer on 2nd September 2024:
The Lord Bishop of Manchester asked His Majesty’s Government whether they plan to publish the data, routinely collected since February 2022, on care leavers claiming Universal Credit.
Baroness Sherlock (Lab, DWP): We have no plans to publish data on care leavers claiming Universal Credit.
Continue reading “Bishop of Manchester asks about data on universal credit for care leavers”The Bishop of Manchester spoke on the topic of criminal justice during the King’s speech debate on 24th July 2024, welcoming the government’s focus on community policing and policies to introduce a duty of candour for public officials:
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow my former boss.
As a trustee of the Clink Charity, where we help prisoners build skills for employment in the catering industry, I too welcome the noble Lord, Lord Timpson, and congratulate him on a powerful and hopeful speech. He might wish to know that the Clink restaurant at Styal prison won the Cheshire Life restaurant of the year award earlier this week. If his team can draw my remarks to his attention, I hope he will accept an invitation to dine with me there later this year, so he can see for himself. However, as my right reverend friend the Bishop of Gloucester has spoken eloquently about prisons already, I will focus elsewhere.
Continue reading “King’s Speech Debate: Bishop of Manchester welcomes focus on communities and accountability”The Bishop of Manchester asked a question on the governments plans to tackle holiday hunger for children on 24th July 2024, raising the example of church projects offering support to children and families in school holidays:
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: Something like seven out of every eight local authorities now use this money to alleviate holiday hunger among our children. Can we have any hope that the Government will look at a more strategic way of helping children cope with hunger during the school holidays? Many of the churches in my diocese, and those of my right reverend friends here, are having to put on voluntary projects to support children during those periods. What can we hope for?
Continue reading “Bishop of Manchester asks about issue of holiday hunger for children”The Bishop of Manchester spoke at the second reading of the Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Bill on 13th May 2024, supporting the intent of the bill and commenting on the importance of safeguarding the rule of law whilst ensuring the swift exoneration of the victims of the Horizon scandal:
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: My Lords, I admit to being a little nervous as a non-lawyer entering a debate that has already heard from so many distinguished minds. Some may think that they have heard enough from the lawyers and do not need to hear from me.
I am grateful to the Minister for introducing the Bill. I concur with other noble Lords in hoping that it will be swiftly passed into law. The many victims of this long-running scandal and injustice must now benefit without further undue delay. As the noble Lord said in opening this debate, Parliament is not the usual route by which we overturn wrongful convictions. I echo others today, as well as what I have said in debates on other matters, in believing that we need to tread very carefully when acting in ways that move us on to territory more normally occupied by the courts and the judiciary. That is particularly important in Britain, because we give such huge weight to precedent. The Minister has, I am pleased to note, assured us that this Bill should not be considered a setting of precedent, and others have concurred. However, I think that that aspect of what we are doing merits, albeit briefly, deeper consideration. What one Government do today, no matter how warily, may be drawn on by future Governments in ways that stretch the original intentions well beyond breaking point. Our best defence against that, perhaps our only defence, is to set down very clear principles, not merely general assertions, at the outset.
Continue reading “Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Bill: Bishop of Manchester welcomes legislation and raises issue of maintaining the rule of law”The Bishop of Manchester asked a question on the issue of advanced release dates preventing prisoners from completing qualifications begun whilst in prison, during a discussion on the End of Custody Supervised Licence Scheme on 13th May 2024:
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: My Lords, I declare that I am a trustee of the Clink Charity: we are involved with training people in prison for qualifications for restaurants, catering and the like. Those last few weeks in prison are often a crucial time for prisoners gaining the qualifications they need to get a decent job when they are released. I am sure every prisoner wants to go as soon as they can, but is the Minister aware, and will the Government take consideration, of the effect of prisoners not receiving their qualifications because they have not quite been completed by the time their advanced release date comes?
Continue reading “Bishop of Manchester asks about impact of early release on prisoner qualifications”The Bishop of Manchester tabled a question on the potential benefits of bringing the rate of Universal Credit for care leavers under 25 in line with the rate for over-25s on 13th May 2024:
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the potential benefits of bringing the rate of Universal Credit for care leavers under 25 in line with the rate for over-25s.
Continue reading “Bishop of Manchester asks about uprating universal credit for care leavers”On 8th May 2024, Bishop of Manchester spoke in support of a Motion to Regret tabled by Lord Berkeley: “That this House regrets the Government’s decision to lay the National Networks National Policy Statement, laid before the House on 6 March, without carrying out the systematic review of road projects recommended by the Climate Change Committee; addressing the risk of insufficient environmental action by the Department for Transport highlighted by the National Audit Office; or joining up their policies with the missions presented to Parliament under the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023.“
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: My Lords, as it seems compulsory in this short debate to quote Voltaire, perhaps I might take us to his wonderful creation, Dr Pangloss, who continues to assert:
“All is for the best in this best of all possible worlds”
even while the horrors are descending around him. I feel there is something of that in the statement; it is a bit Panglossian. As noble Lords have already said, we face a climate emergency and crisis, and this statement is not adequate to the seriousness of the situation that we are in.
Continue reading “Bishop of Manchester supports motion to regret on National Networks Policy statement”The Bishop of St Albans received the following written answer on 29th April 2024:
The Lord Bishop of Manchester asked His Majesty’s Government what plans they have to introduce legislation which would ban the practice of conversion therapy.
Baroness Barran (Con, Women & Equalities): The Government is taking account of the recently published final report from the independent Cass Review.
Continue reading “Bishop of Manchester asks about plans to ban conversion therapy in the UK”On 24th April 2024, the House of Lords debated the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill in Committee. The Bishop of Manchester moved his amendment 28 to the bill, and made a speech in support of the amendment, which “would provide that, where the freeholder in the case of a lease extension or freehold enfranchisement is a charity which had owned the freehold interest since before the passing of the Bill, marriage and hope value are payable.”
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: My Lords, while I thoroughly enjoyed that previous group, I hope this one will not prove quite so wide-ranging. In tabling these amendments, my aim is to deal with an issue that in the charity world is specific to a small number of bodies but would severely impact the work that they do. First, I am a leaseholder myself, as it happens, as set out in the register of interests. I have been through the process of extending my lease; my flat is not in London, and it was quite a simple and cheap process. Secondly, although I am no longer on the board of governors of the Church Commissioners, it is the body that pays my stipend, owns my home and covers my working expenses, so I declare that interest too.
The commissioners are directly affected by the proposals in the Bill. They would indeed benefit from my amendments but, as has already been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Truscott, in the previous group, that charity is large enough to withstand the adverse impact. Smaller charities would struggle much harder to maintain their work, and it is their case I seek to plead today.
Continue reading “Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill: Bishop of Manchester tables amendment on compensation for charities”On 23rd April 2024, the House of Lords debated the Victims and Prisoners Bill. Votes were held on amendments to the bill, in which bishops took part:
The Church of England in Parliament 
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