Fiona
Bruce MP leads debate in Parliament on the contribution of faith groups to
local communities
Fiona
Bruce led a debate yesterday in Parliament on the value of the contribution by
faith organisations to local communities.
Citing
the enormous variety of voluntary work undertaken by churches, Fiona Bruce spoke of the top ten activities
undertaken by churches as involving:
“food distribution; parent and toddler
groups; school assemblies and religious education work; festivals and fun days;
children’s clubs for those aged up to 11; caring for the elderly; debt
counselling; youth work for those aged 12 to 18; cafés that are open to the
public; and marriage counselling courses. Every one of these activities takes
place in my constituency, most multiple times. The tremendous work done by
church members in my constituency is, I am sure, representative of that taking
place across the country, often in the toughest and most challenging situations
and areas. I am talking about street pastors helping the homeless at night;
addiction support; job clubs, which are particularly successful in New Life
church in my constituency; helping victims of human trafficking; supporting
children with special needs; prison visiting; literacy projects; fostering and
adoption support; and getting alongside those with mental health problems (…) the
value of these activities to society is vast.”
However,
she also strongly pressed the Government to drop proposals to require outside of
school organisations teaching young people for more than six hours a week to
register with the Government and potentially be Ofsted inspected saying of the Government’s proposals:
“It is proposed that if members of a
Christian youth group engage in sport or games on one day a week, or meet on
one evening a week and, perhaps, on Sundays to discuss their faith, Ofsted
inspectors can visit them to establish whether their activities are compatible
with a list of British values drawn up by the Government to find out whether
they are extremist. Could any of the types of work that I have described today
be described as extremist? Actually, perhaps they could, because of their love,
care and concern for the most vulnerable and needy in our society. However, I
submit that there is nothing less British than the Government restricting the
expression of religious faith based on an arbitrary set of values drawn up in
Whitehall. That is the very opposite of what I understand conservatism to be (...)
there is grave concern on the part of many Christians across the country about
these proposals, and rightly so (…) the proposals could deter volunteerism.”
She added:
“Whilst Christians wholeheartedly
support reasonable measures to prevent terrorism and violent extremism, these
proposals will lead to a loss of civil liberties and create a large bureaucracy
that will divert resources away from restraining extremists who reject UK law.”
Speaking also in the debate, Stephen
Timms MP agreed saying it is not for Ofsted to “be a state regulator of
religion.”
