FROM BRITAIN AND IRELAND NEWS


Cash-strapped dioceses combine to increase purchasing power


Sam Adams


A CENTRALISED system for purchasing goods and services has been created by the Church to help reduce costs among cash- strapped dioceses and religious communities. The Church faces major financial difficulties in the new year with an increase in VAT, a loss in gift aid, and the increase in insurance tax. The most recent accounts filed at the Charity Commission show that some of the biggest dioceses have already suffered a sig- nificant fall in income. Under the new scheme, called Church


Marketplace (churchmarketplace.org.uk), parishes, dioceses, religious orders and schools in England and Wales will be encouraged to purchase what they need centrally from selected suppliers at discounted prices via a web shopping portal. It is designed to use the combined purchasing power of church bodies to negotiate lower costs for basic goods and services – as do other large organisations and government departments. The initiative, which is being tested in the Dioceses of Westminster and Portsmouth before being officially rolled out this month, aims to encourage companies to see the


Pope gives historic BBC broadcast


BENEDICT XVI became the first Pope in history to speak on BBC Radio 4’s “Thought for the Day” slot when he delivered the broadcast on Christmas Eve, writes Christopher Lamb. In a pre-recorded reflection for the Today programme, the Pope recalled “with great fondness” his visit to Britain last year. Pope Benedict’s participation in the programme was a coup for the BBC, whose head of religion and ethics for radio, Christine Morgan, lobbied the Vatican for three years asking if the Pope would consider giving the reflection. The BBC director general, Mark Thompson, who is a Catholic, is understood to have asked last February for the Pope to give a “Thought for the Day” and it is believed that Mr Thompson’s intervention was crucial in persuading Benedict XVI and his aides to take up the idea at Christmas. (See www.thetablet.co.uk for the Pope’s script.)


36 | THE TABLET | 1 January 2011


Diocese Salford Clifton


Westminster Liverpool


Birmingham Southwark


Income £m 2008


24.5 11.1 44.6 50.1 21.5 25.8


Income £m 2009


17.8 9.3


39.3 46.2 20.1 24.6


FIGURES: THE CHARITY COMMISSION


Church as a “definitive market” to do business with.


Stephen Morgan, head of finance for the Diocese of Portsmouth and chairman of the Conference of Diocesan Financial Secretaries, said some dioceses will have to make “tough decisions” about spending over the next 12 months. “The key thing going forward is find- ing ways to keep spending under control.” The Tablet understands that redundancies


may have to be made in some of the worst- affected dioceses. A church insider, who did not want to be named, said the Church Marketplace scheme was designed “to get the commercial world to treat us as a single entity.


Difference £m


-6.7 -1.8 -5.3 -3.9 -1.4 -1.2


% Change -27.35 -16.22 -11.88 -7.78 -6.51 -4.65


Put simply, when thousands of indi- vidual parishes and schools order indi- vidually, you won’t get as good a deal from suppliers,” he added.


During the cur- rent testing phase, buyers can purchase office and cleaning supplies and IT


equipment from the website, although this is likely to be expanded to include a wide range of services, such as gas and electricity to schools. Potential suppliers were inter- viewed before being selected for the scheme and their ethical values were checked. The Church Marketplace system, which has been in development for six months, is also designed to bring greater “solidarity” to the Church, although using it will not be com- pulsory. Its launch is being coordinated by representatives from the Dioceses of Leeds, Birmingham, Portsmouth, Westminster and the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales.


Conversions rise as Massgoing declines


THE NUMBER of people received into the Church has increased by almost 20 per cent, and baptisms and marriages are also on the rise, new figures suggest, writes Christopher Lamb.


According to the 2011 Catholic Directory of England and Wales, the number of converts rose from 4,378 to 5,247 in 2009, the most recent year for which figures are available. Baptisms increased by almost 500 to 64,010 (although this figure includes children bap- tised up to the age of seven). The number of marriages rose to 9,968, compared to the pre- vious year’s total of 9,932, its highest level for three years.


While the increase in receptions is good


news for the Church, the figures also show that about 20,000 fewer people were attend- ing Mass on a weekly basis. Forty-two parish churches closed during the year and the num- ber of other churches open to the public declined by 44. The number of diocesan priests remained stable at more than 3,500 while the number of permanent deacons


rose for the fifth year running to a total of 752. The figures for baptisms, receptions and marriages are supplied to the directory by parishes, which also calculate the numbers of Massgoers by taking a count on a typical Sunday. The Bishop of Portsmouth, Crispian Hollis, said the increase in receptions was a sign of the “thirst for faith” among the young. “People in the younger generation have a thirst for faith and the Church offers them some- thing substantial, community-based and long term, which is attractive,” he said. Bishop Hollis thought the overall fall in churchgoing could be a symptom of the grow- ing time restraints on families.“Someone who describes themselves as a committed Catholic now may go to church three times a month rather than every Sunday. There are far greater restraints on families’ time than when I was a child.” Distribution of the new directory, published by Gabriel Communications, was delayed by production problems. The first print run was withdrawn after it was realised that the section on statistics had been omitted.


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