What happened at Lambeth 2008

THE 2008 LAMBETH CONFERENCE of Anglican bishops in Canterbury July 16-August 3 was a milestone in this march of relativism. While nothing extraordinary happened - no fist fights or beatific visions - a number of prelates came away from Lambeth realizing the Anglican Communion no longer worked. Its structures were not a place for holy men, but for hollow men: bishops who knew in their hollow hearts they were stuffed with straw, trapped in a purposeless whirl of apathy and spiritual torpor called "dialogue." The Anglican Communion had finally broken, coming to an end "not with a bang but a whimper."

While past Lambeth Conferences have endeavored to speak clearly on matters of common concern as a guide to the global church, Lambeth 2008 was designed to, and did, decline to draw the line between the irreconcilable claims of the left and right. Gene Robinson's cry that "God is doing a new thing," and that the affirmation of his election as Bishop of New Hampshire showed that "God has once again brought an Easter out of Good Friday," was left to stand alongside the claims of traditionalists like Fort Worth Bishop Jack Iker, who argued that the standard the church must use in moving forward with change was the rule of Vincent of Lerins: a once-for-all received faith, witnessed everywhere and by all. Quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est.

While the liberal juggernaut has ground through The Episcopal Church (TEC) over the past generation, carrying prayer book revision and women's ordination with it across the 38-province Anglican Communion, Vincent's 5th century rule had been consistently applied to questions of sexual ethics. At the 13th Lambeth Conference in 1998, bishops of the Communion affirmed by a 7 to 1 margin the church's traditional teaching on human sexuality, as informed by Scripture and the church's unbroken teaching of 2,000 years.

The onus lies with those who seek change to convince the church of the need for it, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, explained after Lambeth '98. Listening to proponents of change acknowledges their honorable motives, he told the clergy of the Diocese of Central Florida in 2003, but entering into a conversation with them does not validate their arguments.

"Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent," George Orwell once wrote of Gandhi, and the same standard applies in the development of doctrine, Lord Carey argued. However, the 14th Lambeth Conference under the presidency of Archbishop Rowan Williams said goodbye to all that.

AT LAMBETH '08, Dr. Williams lost the confidence of his fellow archbishops, and left the Communion millions in debt, and on the same trajectory as before the Conference began. Left and right have rejected his pleas for restraint, vitiating the renewed call in Canterbury for moratoria on gay bishops and blessings and cross-border episcopal actions, pending putative rescue by an Anglican Covenant at some uncertain date. New layers of bureaucracy suggested at Lambeth (e.g. a "Pastoral Forum" and "Faith and Order Commission") remain to be developed at a time when many saw stronger measures to restore order as overdue. Meanwhile, Roman Catholic and Orthodox representatives announced the effective end of talks aimed at corporate reunion and the recognition of Anglican orders.

Philosophically, the Lambeth Conference witnessed the retirement of the historic Anglican guides of Scripture, Tradition and reason in divining truth. Scripture was subordinated to experience and culture, reason rejected in favor of political power, and Tradition debased into equal parts antiquarianism and haberdashery.

Click to read full report

Some Regulations coming into force in UK in October 2008

Employment Bill

On 6 December 2007 the Employment Bill was published in the House of Lords. It aims to simplify, clarify and develop a stronger enforcement regime for certain aspects of employment law. Provisions include:

• changes to the law relating to dispute resolution in the workplace as a response to the Gibbons review. This will include:
• repealing the current statutory dispute resolution procedures and related provisions about procedural unfairness in dismissal cases,
• changes to the law relating to conciliation by Acas  
• revision of the Acas code on discipline and grievance and tribunals will be able to adjust awards by 25% where parties have unreasonably failed to follow the code, 
• the delivery of a more straightfoward and transparent enforcement and penalties regime for the national minimum wage (NMW) and employment agency standards, 
• compliance with the European Court of Human Rights decision in Aslef v UK which concerned the rights of trade unions to determine their members.

Will apply to Great Britain, but the National Minimum Wage Act 1998, which is amended in clauses 8 to 13 also extends to Northern Ireland.

No implementation date has been given but the Bill is likely to come into force in April 2009.

The text of the Bill, explanatory notes and details of its progress through Parliament are available on the Parliament website.

• Go to Parliament website

More information on the Bill can be found on the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) website.

• Go to BERR website

Details of the revised Acas code are available in the Codes of practice section. Acas has published draft non-statutory guidance to complement the code.

Education and Skills Bill

The Bill was published on 29 November 2007 and aims to meet the ambition set out in the Leitch Review of achieving world class skills by 2020. Key proposals include:

• raising education or training leaving age to 17 years by 2013 and to 18 years by 2015
• giving adults a right to basic and intermediate skills and enabling the benefits of adult skills to be measured.

Will apply to the United Kingdom.

The text of the Bill, explanatory memorandum and details of its progress through Parliament are available on the Parliament website.

• Go to Parliament website

Additional paternity leave

In March 2006 the Government published a consultation paper on how to implement the scheme under the Work and Families Act 2006 which will allow employed fathers to take up to 26 weeks Additional Paternity Leave (APL), some of which could be paid if the mother has returned to work. The Government intends to introduce the scheme alongside the extension of statutory maternity pay and statutory adoption pay to twelve months. Consultation ended on 31 March 2006.

In November 2006 the Government published its response to the consultation. The response and further information is available on the Department Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform website.

• Go to BERR website

In May 2007 the Government launched a further consultation on the administration of APL following the November 2006 response. Employed fathers (including civil partners or adoptive parents) will be able to take up to 26 weeks additional paternity leave, some of which can be paid if the mother of the child returns to work. Consultation ended on 3 August 2007. The earliest date that the leave would be implemented would be for babies due on or after 5 April 2009, but this was not definite. In January 2008 the Government published its response to the consultation. The consultation paper and Government response is available on the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform website.