The Church Law Campaign

The church law campaign is focus on the legal regulation of non-established churches, meaning non Church of England (CoE) churches.

At present there are hundreds of churches formed within the UK each year and they are answerable to no one. Yes, if their income is above £5,000 they are required to register with the Charity Commission and registration with the Charity Commission only means that their finances will be accounted for. The Charity Commission investigate financial irregularities and do not get involve in the trustees' general administration of churches, their general conduct or misconduct, investigate non-financial complains or get involves in or specify disciplinary measures or complain handling procedures.

Although churches and pastors have a 'duty to care' and therefore have an automatic duty of care placed on them. Quite sadly, not all churches realise or accept the fact that their pastors have a 'duty of care' owed to those they pastor and we have been in touch we at least one barristers who concluded that churches in fact owe a duty of care to those they pastor. It is easy for dishonest corrupt churches and pastors to deny this fact or knowledge of this fact and victims often face an uphill struggle proving their cases. This is because unlike the CoE pastors, the pastors of these churches are not regulated by law in terms of legal disciplinary measures and the legal duty of care or/and pastoral care standards by which they are regulated are not defined by specific legislations. This is shocking when taken into consideration that such organisations comes into contact with vulnerable members of the public seeking spiritual directions making the public an easy target for manipulation and abuse.

When such churches fails members of the public in the services they provide, there are no legislations by which they can be held accountable in cases where there are ministerial, administrative and spiritual negligence and where there are abuse of visitors and members alike. When it can be proven that within a different profession these churches and their ministers would be liable for breach of duty and care it is more difficult to bring such charges against non CoE churches as they are not covered under similar CoE legislation.

This is where The Church Law Campaign comes in. We are seeking to get together a group of concern Christians who are willing to petition their local MPs in putting pressure on the Faiths and Cohesion Unit at the Department for Communities and Local Government and Parliament to pass suitable legislations that will make these churches and their ministers accountable. Join us!