Pastoral Work Of Priests And Ministers Of Religion

EDM number 502 in 1996-97, proposed by Andrew Mackinlay on 10/02/1997.

That this House notes the concern expressed by Cardinal Hume and other churchmen of many denominations about the implications that the new surveillance powers contained in the Police Bill (Lords) will have for the confidentiality of confession and the traditional pastoral counselling and conversations conducted between Ministers of Religion and members of their flock; notes that in his representations to the Home Secretary the cardinal states 'An individual penitent who goes to confession to a priest has to be certain that, whatever the crime, not only will the priest never reveal what is said, but that the state will not conspire to undermine the Church's guarantee of absolute secrecy. If a sacramental confession can be bugged, worse still used in evidence, a fundamental right to the practice of religion is put in jeopardy'; considers that as presently drafted these surveillance powers would offend the spirit, if not the letter, of the Church of England's unrepealed Cannon 113 of 1603; considers that the right to the confidential counselling by one's religious Minister should never be abrogated by a democratic state; and therefore calls on the Home Secretary to introduce amendments to the Police Bill (Lords) which would specifically exclude the confidential pastoral conversations of Priests and Ministers from the bugging and surveillance powers to be conferred on the Police by this Bill.

This motion has been signed by a total of 62 MPs.