On Saturday, he stood before a throne in Westminster Abbey and carefully placed a crown on the head of King Charles III. On Wednesday, he stood in the gilded chamber of the House of Lords to denounce the government’s new immigration law as “morally unacceptable and politically impractical.”
This is an important week for the archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev. Justin Welby – someone who has earned his unique place in British life. Not only is the senior bishop of the Church of England, the man who crowns monarchs, he is also a member of the unelected upper house of the British Parliament.
Archbishop Welby won praise for his sure conduct of the coronation ceremony. But his fiery intervention in the immigration debate drew a tart response from government ministers and other Conservative politicians, who said the law was needed to curb the number of migrants crossing illegally. English Channel in small boats.
“He is wrong on two counts,” the immigration minister, Robert Jenrick, told the BBC. “There is nothing moral about allowing the harmful trade of people smugglers to continue,” he said. “I disagree with him politely.”
“By bringing this proposition,” continued Mr. Jenrick, “we explained that if you find illegal in a small boat, you will not find a life route in the UK That will have a serious deterrent effect.”
It is not unusual for Archbishop Welby, 67, to weigh in on political or social-justice issues. He spoke about same-sex marriage, tax policy, rising energy bills and what he called the divisive impact of Brexit. But his speech in the House of Lords carried extra weight because immigration law is a pillar of the government’s legislative agenda, and the law, which will remove almost all asylum seekers who arrive in small boats, got a poor reception in the chamber.
Because of the Conservative Party’s majority in the House of Commons – currently 64 seats – the House of Lords is unlikely to torpedo the law. But it could slow down the process by including amendments to the bill and sending it back to the Commons, where the Conservatives would have to override it.
Archbishop Welby’s words won front-page headlines in British newspapers, making him an influential voice in one of the country’s most charged policy debates. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s government has come under heavy criticism from human rights experts for threatening to put migrants arriving in Britain illegally on one-way flights to Rwanda, with which Britain has a relocation agreement.
But cracking down on immigration remains popular with pro-Brexit voters who helped give the Conservative Party a landslide victory in the 2019 general election. Sunak must call the next election in January 2025. For that reason, political analysts said they expect Sunak to continue pushing the law, regardless of criticism from human rights groups or leaders of the religion like the archbishop.
“What is interesting is that the Church of England used to be called the Tory Party of prayer,” said Baroness Rosalind Scott, member of the House of Lords from the Liberal Democratic Party. “But the Tory Party has drifted to the right, while the Church of England has stayed in place or drifted slightly to the left. It is very interesting to see that the bishops are fighting the government on this issue.
Archbishop Welby argued that the legislation was fundamentally flawed because it ignored the drivers of mass migration, from war to climate change. As an expression of social policy, he said, the bill “fails to comply with our history, our moral responsibility and our political and international interests.”
“We can’t get everyone and we don’t need to,” he said. “But this bill does not make sense of all the long-term and global nature of the challenge facing the world. It ignores the reality that migration must be related to the origin, as well as the path, as income, as a country, unrelated to the rest of the world.
In all his criticism, Archbishop Welby called for the law to be amended rather than thrown away. Liberal Democratic Lords proposed a motion to reject the bill altogether, which gained little support.
A former oil company employee who only began training as a priest in 1987, Archbishop Welby has long sought to balance religious tradition in a changing society. He supported the consecration of women as bishops and included them in the coronation ceremony. But other proposals have met with equal success.
In the days before the coronation, he proposed extending the oath of honor to the new king to cover millions of people across Britain and its far-flung kingdoms, rather than just members of the aristocracy. .
But the move backfired, with critics on social media saying it was daring and politically motivated in a democracy. Archbishop Welby was quick to clarify that the oath was voluntary.
The archbishop’s attack on immigration law has drawn renewed attention to the Church of England’s role in the House of Lords. Bishops have had seats in the chamber for centuries, dating to their status as landowners in the early English Parliament. There are currently 26 bishops with seats, five of which, including Archbishop Welby, automatically get them because of their rank (the others are chosen by seniority).
Critics have argued for the removal of bishops from the House of Lords, saying their presence is unfashionable and undemocratic in a country that is largely secular and where the Church of England is just one of many belief.
“The strange thing is that there are lords’ bishops,” said Peter Ricketts, a retired British diplomat who is a cross-bench member of the House of Lords, meaning he does not represent a party. “I agree that there is a good case for ending this practice.”
“But since we have them, it does not surprise me that they will speak, including where the draft laws raise moral issues,” continued Mr. Ricketts. “That, in a way, is the point of having them, after all.”
