St Albans – Page 71 – The Church of England in Parliament

Building Safety Bill: Bishop of St Albans urges proportional approach

On 2nd March 2022, the House of Lords debated amendments to the Building Safety Bill in Grand Committee. The Bishop of St Albans spoke in favour of a proportional approach to new safety regulations, balancing the need for remediation of risk with the potential effects on leaseholders:

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: My Lords, I will add a few extra words to this. I apologise to the Committee; I am struggling, as I think a number of us are, as there are so many Bills going through that we are bobbing in and out of various Bills. It is frustrating for us that we cannot necessarily sit and follow everything through, but I think this probing amendment touches on some really important issues for us.

Not surprisingly, after the absolute horror of Grenfell, we are rightly trying to think about how we offer maximum safety for everybody. But safety comes at a cost, as we are all aware. As we work on a Bill that we hope will do its job for many years, we need to take an objective view on some of these areas, particularly on what the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, said about proportionality.

Votes: Nationality and Borders Bill 2022

On 2nd March 2022, the House of Lords debated the Nationality and Borders Bill in its second day of the report stage. Votes were held on amendments to the bill, in which Bishops took part.

Votes: Health and Care Bill

On 1st March 2022, the House of Lords debated the Health and Care Bill in the first day of the report stage. Votes were held on amendments to the bill, in which Bishops took part:

Votes: Nationality and Borders Bill

On 28th February 2022, the House of Lords debated the Nationality and Borders Bill in the first day of the report stage. Votes were held on amendments to the bill, in which Bishops took part:

Building Safety Bill: Bishop of St Albans tables amendment

On 28th February the House of Lords debated the Building Safety Bill in the 3rd day of committee. The Bishop of St Albans spoke in support of his amendment 50A, which aims to strengthen tenants rights to consult with landlords over building safety, and require landlords to set up tenants associations to facilitate this:

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 50A in my name and those of the noble Lords, Lord Blencathra and Lord Young of Cookham. Let me say how much I support the sentiments and intentions of the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, who has done us a real service.

I, too, do not want to die over the details of this amendment. I hope that this will stimulate a really vigorous debate so that we can all work together on how we get these sorts of commitments in the Bill. I and others on my Benches want to work with the Government and others to achieve this. If someone else can turn up with much better solutions, that is great.

Throughout the cladding and fire safety crisis, we have heard many stories of landlords imposing outrageous and sometimes astronomical building safety charges on leaseholders and tenants. Often this has been done by managing agents acting on behalf of the freeholder. Leaseholders and tenants have reported a complete lack of accountability and transparency throughout this process and have been unable to challenge or even scrutinise the charges imposed on them.

Building Safety Bill: Bishop of St Albans speaks in favour of amendments to protect leaseholders and social housing

On 24th February 2022, the House of Lords debated the Building Safety Bill in the second day of committee. The Bishop of St Albans spoke in favour of a number of amendments relating to leaseholder protections and the proposed building safety levy:

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 35. I was expecting others to speak to it first, but I shall address it briefly. I declare my interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. I, too, am an enthusiastic amateur and rise with great hesitation. I also apologise for arriving fractionally late and going in and out, but I have amendments about to run on the Judicial Review and Courts Bill, so I have been trying to balance things in two places.

Whenever a new tax is applied to an industry or business, it is extremely rare that a given organisation simply chooses to absorb that additional cost. In the overwhelming majority of instances, the tax will be passed on to the consumer as a price rise. Businesses rarely undermine their own bottom line when there is little competitive advantage for doing so and where the cost can be simply passed on to the consumer without hurting the demand for their product.

The market is such that there is a massive, chronic shortage of supply of homes in the UK. This undersupply means that, in reality, developers know that demand will not greatly suffer as a result of the building safety levy. They will not absorb the tax. I fear it will simply be priced on top of the cost of new properties. After all, this is the free market, and we cannot escape the fact that that is likely to be the consequence of the levy.

Bishop of St Albans tables question on political prisoners in Hong Kong

On 22nd February 2022, Lord Alton of Liverpool asked a question on human rights and political prisoners in Hong Kong, on behalf of the Bishop of St Albans:

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what representations they have made to the Government of Hong Kong about the (1) human rights, and (2) release, of pro- democracy political prisoners remanded in custody under that Government’s national security law.

Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB): My Lords, on behalf of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans, and with his permission, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in his name on the Order Paper. In so doing, I declare my interests both as a patron of Hong Kong Watch and as vice-chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Hong Kong.

The Earl of Courtown (Con): My Lords, the mainland Chinese and Hong Kong authorities have used the national security law to target pro-democracy figures, curtail freedoms and shrink the space for opposition, a free press and civil society. The UK continues to raise its concerns directly with Hong Kong and Chinese authorities. We continue to urge Beijing to uphold its international obligations, including the rights and freedoms protected in the joint declaration.

Bishop of St Albans asks about rural health in the Integration White Paper

The Bishop of St Albans asked a question on references to rural health in the the Integration White Paper on 10th February 2022:

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: My Lords, I declare my interests as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and president of the Rural Coalition. I want to pick up very briefly on what the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, said about rural issues. It is disappointing that there are no explicit references to rural health. One of the concerns of the APPG on Rural Health and Social Care parliamentary inquiry was the way in which inappropriate data, metrics and funding formulas can disadvantage rural areas. National programmes are one thing, but when they are delegated to local areas how are we going to ensure that they are properly rural-proofed and will integrate both health and care?

Nationality and Borders Bill: Bishop of St Albans supports amendments to clause on modern slavery decision thresholds

During a committee debate on the Nationality and Borders Bill on 10th February 2022, the Bishop of St Albans spoke in support of amendments to clause 59 of the bill, relating to thresholds for assessing victims of modern slavery via the National Referral System. The amendments would seek to stop the threshold for assessment of modern slavery victims being raised above the standard of “suspect but cannot prove.”

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: My Lords, I shall speak to amendments 156A and 156B in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool, and the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, to which I have added my name. I hope I can be fairly brief because much of the ground has been set out brilliantly by the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and I am very grateful for that.

The reality of Clause 59 is that raising the threshold—from “reasonable grounds” to believe that someone maybe a victim of modern slavery, to “is” such a victim—could lead to the national referral mechanism failing to identify victims of modern slavery, effectively shutting them out of the support that they so desperately need. That was picked up yesterday in our General Synod debate across the road, to which the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bristol has already alluded.

Bishop of St Albans asks about gambling levies

The Bishop of St Albans asked a question on tackling harms related to gambling during a debate on the Gambling Act 2005 on 9th February 2022:

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: My Lords, I declare my interests as a member of Peers for Gambling Reform. The British Medical Journal said:

“We do not allow tobacco companies to design tobacco control policies, yet the gambling industry, through the organisations it funds, shapes our responses to … harms”.

Does the Minister agree that the system of voluntary levies is part of the problem, because the industry is controlling the messaging, and that what we need are statutory, smart levies to give total independence to research, treatment and education if we are really to tackle gambling-related harms?

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: