London, UK - Former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer of Thoroton has said a discussion now “needs to be had” on whether the Church of England should be disestablished.
In a BBC programme Decision Time, which will be broadcast on Radio 4 tomorrow night Lord Falconer says the issue of disesablishment is “in the air”.
He was speaking as a long-running review of disestablishment by University College London’s Constitutional Unit was published. In Church and State in the 21st Century: The Future of Church Establishment, Bob Morris argues that Britain remains locked in the political structures of the 17th century and that it is time to look again at the relationship between Church and State.
Lord Falconer, referring to the divisive debate over homosexuality that is threatening to split the Anglican Communion, he criticises the Church of England as “more and more hemmed in” by Anglican provinces overseas which prevent it from remaining “in tune” with society in England.
“Its role as a Church able to speak in the State whose church it is gets more and more difficult so I think a discussion needs to be had and this is probably the time to have it."
Only last week his successor, Justice Secretary Jack Straw, talked out Lib Dem MP Evan Harris’s private member’s bill designed to remove the anomaly in British law under which the monarch may neither be nor marry a Catholic, and nor may the monarch’s heirs.
Lord Falconer says: “We could easily, I think, make it possible for the Monarch to be a Roman Catholic.”
He proposed making the Archbishop of Canterbury instead of the monarch the head of the Church and make the church itself a national religion as the Presbyterian Church is in Scotland.
“Britain is incredibly good at getting round those sorts of problems,” he says.
He admits there are no votes in it but says: “It’s plainly an idea whose time has come.”
He continues: “We need to move forward on this. I think you will find that the timidity that currently grips this issue will suddenly get replaced by somebody, whether it is the Archbishop of Canterbury of the day or the Monarch of the day or the Prime Minister of the day, who will suddenly say this is what I propose and it will happen.”