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Welfare: Churches and Faith Communities

My Lords, I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate and I thank the right reverend Prelate for introducing it. Looking through the recommendations of the report, some of them need a red alert. One suggests appointing a government Minister for religion and social cohesion. I believe that would require a tremendous amount of discussion and I would not be too happy with it as it stands. I also see that the Von Hügel report is mentioned. We could look at it and say, ““Yes, it is very much geared to the activities of the Church of England””. It mentions the, "““important roles of bishops, dioceses and cathedrals””." Who am I to disparage the roles of bishops, and so on, who contribute so much to life? But there are other churches, too. The report does not seem to grapple with them very extensively. It recognises that these recommendations, "““may have some ecumenical potential””." In our age, to look at anything which does not have an ecumenical potential is to look at something which is not totally effective. I welcome the presence of my colleague—Methodist-wise—the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Burry Port, who has a pew in St Paul's Cathedral. I had the great honour of taking part in a Catholic ordination service and I have also walked with some of the bishops on the heritage march at the end of the Lambeth conference. What a great opportunity it was to work together. So my first point is that the report is a little bit frugal about Von Hügel. More is needed than we see here. It is a report for a Britain of some years ago and not for the multi-faith society which we have today, in which you do not ask people: ““What is your creed?””, if they have any creed at all, but, ““Will you join us in building this new society; will you co-operate?””. I note the question about partnership, but the true partnership is with everyone in the community. Strength will come from that. Last week, I had the privilege of going to Poland to be part of the Barka Foundation which has made it possible for 7,000 Polish migrants in the UK, who were not able to make a go of it here, to go back, in particular to the Poznan area where there are settlements, small factories, farms, housing developments and leisure facilities where people work together. It involves the local authority, the Government, individuals and, of course, the church. It is a multi-faith, multi-faceted organisation. I look for much more discussion on this report. It seems to me to lack an ecumenical aspect. Those of faith and those who possibly find it difficult to have a faith at all should all be involved in the building up of our communities.