Both God and mammon
Robin Denniston
NUMBER ONE, MILLBANK: THE FINANCIAL DOWNFALL OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND by Terry Lovell HarperCollins, £15.99, pp. 256 Ayear or so ago the editor of the Spec- tator was kind enough to publish a letter of mine about the role of the Church Com- missioners in the financial scandals of the early 1990s. I asked the question, who were the main beneficiaries of the Church Com- missioners' annual distributions, and was there a significant overlap between these persons and the body of Commissioners who were responsible for the pay-outs? If so — and it clearly was so — then surely they should acknowledge a conflict of interest by resigning, not because they had performed so lamentably as non-executive directors of an organisation in deep trouble but because their own income, expenses, palace upkeep, pension, way of life were (and still are) chargeable to what was left of the Church Commissioners' surpluses.
lt was a tough audience last night.' Non-executive directors, we have come to learn, earn their place on company boards by assisting in fixing the salaries of the chief executives and by some sort of guar- antee of financial probity. But these people were simply ring-fencing their own stan- dard of living. This still unresolved ques- tion is deeply unimportant but will not go quietly away.
The Church Commissioners were revealed in the Financial Times of 11th July 1992 to have lost £800 million pounds. The chairman of the Commissioners was only one of many said to have learnt of this fias- co performed by the body over which he presided when the article was drawn to his attention. How, when and where, and why this huge sum (now notionally halved but still considerable) came to be lost is past history. But the history is riveting stuff, well covered by Number One, Millbank, and well worth a trip to the library for those who enjoy financial disaster stories. It is narrat- ed in uncontentious and by the end some- what pietistic terms by Terry Lovell what happened, who did what, what were the consequences and what the world said. The immediate consequences were the report by 'the Lambeth Group'; the Turn- bull report, and drastic amendments there- to; the launching of the 'Archbishops' Council' on an unwilling General Synod; a new First Estates Commissioner and an improved property investment portfolio. From these and other consequences emerged one inescapable fact: the goal- posts may have changed, the scenery shift- ed, and reshifted: but most of the cast were and are still in place. Only one person emerges with real credibility and he, very properly, is now high in government Frank Field MP.
I have been thinking about it in terms of management theory generally, and how, specifically, non-executive (amateur, epis- copal) directors can effectively control pro- fessional money-men charged with the maximisation of income — in their case to pay clergy stipends, pensions and expenses out of historic accruals much of which were already earmarked for the poorer clergy.
The story involves three strands of man- agement. At the cutting edge were the property and investment consultants (one knighted in the 1997 New Year honours), on whose activities Lovell provides solid information, especially Ashford Great Park (chapter 6). In the middle were the appa- ratchiks of Millbank, three of whom were seriously losing control. And over them were the Church Commissioners. This third level of management has eluded Lovell. Does the financial mismanagement over which they presided, does this mis- match between misled civil servants at Millbank-and their nominal supervisors also recipients of much of the largesse they engendered — matter to Anglican Chris- tians, or anyone else? Not really. There are many greater problems and opportunities confronting the C of E, and some of these are being tackled rather well. But unease about the dual role of senior clergy includ- ing all the diocesan bishops and both the archbishops, still lurks more persistently than the establishment seems to realise.
These were the Church Commissioners, 95 of them — 40% consisting of all 41 dioce- san bishops, many appointed before the 1992 debacle emerged; both Cantuar and Ebor: 5 deans and provosts; 10 clergy; 10 lay synod representatives; 4 royal appointees; 4 Cantuar appointees; 2 city of London appointees; 2 Oxbridge appointees and 12 government appointees. Since many of the Commissioners' assets did not belong to them but the nation, it was still fortunate that Field insisted that the state's involvement in church affairs was not allowed to wither. If you look for a list of the great and the good, look no further. The Commissioners, whether 95 or 15 (Turnbull report phase 1) or 35 Turnbull (phase 2) remain unelected appointees of a tight group of mainly ecclesiastical grandees.
Not all were silent, but those who protested were singled out for promotion in what looks like a grand damage-limita- tion exercise. One bishop, keen to promote ethical investment, had an unsuccessful run-in at decentralising control over Com- missioners' investments. In June 1996 he became chairman of the Synod Board for Social Responsibility, which includes eco- nomic affairs. Another was his co-plaintiff who was promoted to the episcopate, thereafter to be followed by a Hertford- shire vicar swiftly recruited onto the Assets Committee. This attempt to cut the Church Commission down to size failed. The poachers had turned gamekeepers, or vice versa.
The story is unfinished, and indeed unending. It is a bit about God and mam- mon. It is about power and privilege, and the obligations that should accompany them. It is also about professionals and amateurs; about how and when to cede responsibility for matters outside your competence; about how to recognise your own weaknesses; about how to apologise and how to offer restitution. The Turnbull report has addressed none of these mat- ters, but sought simply to shore up existing power bases while pressing for greater resourcing from parishes, and unloading tiresome financial commitments down the line while ensuring that bishops are still well housed, well resourced, well pen- sioned.
Why should this matter? Almost every- thing is more important. But perhaps some show of apology, of penitence, some accep- tance of personal shortcoming and conse- quential shedding of authority and privilege, might have reminded our church of its own roots, before Constantine messed things up.
The author is priest-in-charge of the Tews and the Wortons in North Oxfordshire
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