|
|
|
Newsletter: Issue 2
Introduction
Thank you to all who responded so warmly to the first newsletter, in November. The Temple lectures by Diarmaid MacCulloch and Eamon Duffy, which followed hard on its heels, were a very great success. The Society is indebted to Mark Hill for undertaking the organisation of that event.
I am attaching to this newsletter the booking form for the Day Conference of the Society, scheduled for Saturday 27 March. We are privileged to have the Archbishop of York as our principal speaker The subject is controversial: we will be focussing on the Church’s discipline in relation to doctrine. The General Synod has been working on this for some time, and the Bishops of Gibraltar in Europe, and Chester, two of the working party’s members, will be addressing us. The former Bishop of Newcastle, Alec Graham, who was chair of the Doctrine Commission for a number of years, will be acting as an interlocutor.
I do hope as many of you as can make it will join us. It will be a particular opportunity for those members who live in the North of England to meet on “home territory” – while equally enabling Southerners to sample the delights of the historic City of York!
If you have not done so already, do please complete the form accompanying this newsletter and return it to Michael O’Connor.
John Rees (Treasurer)
The Ecclesiastical Collection at Middle Temple
Members of the Society will be interested to have an up-date on the state of the The Ecclesiastical Collection in Middle Temple Library (for previous history see 7 Ecc LJ 242).
The Ecclesiastical Collection is housed in Bays 141-143 in the Gallery at the Library. It includes textbooks, reports and other material relating to Ecclesiastical and Canon Law. In particular there are the bound volumes in episcopal purple containing most judgments given by Chancellors and the Appeal Courts since l971, together with an initial volume containing a selection of judgments between l891 and l970. These judgments are generally unreported elsewhere so that these volumes, which have comprehensive subject indexes and tables, are invaluable to those concerned with problems relating to church disputes. On the whole they are concerned with issues concerning alterations to churches and their contents and some deal with important legal issues. Their principal value is that they enable readers to see how Chancellors have reacted to various factual situations in recent years. This is something which matters very much to Chancellors, Registrars, Archdeacons, barristers and solicitors, academics and those members of the Society interested in ecclesiastical and canon law in a general way.
Members of the Society can of course read the bound volumes at Middle Temple and there is a consolidated index covering volumes 1-20. Recent judgments which have not yet been bound are in boxes on the shelves together with short case summaries which are regularly kept up to date. Copies of judgments which have not yet been bound and of the recent case summaries can be obtained from Hilary Woodard at Middle Temple Library, www.middletemple.org.uk. Prices for photocopying and postage can be obtained from her.
Middle Temple Library: (from left) Dr Sheila Cameron,
Worshipful Michael Goodman, Archbishop Rowan Williams
Michael Goodman
Royal Peculiars
The Lord Chancellor has responded to the report of Professor Averil Cameron’s Review Group on Royal Peculiars. The Group, established to look at the organisation, management and accountability of Westminster Abbey, St. George's Chapel, Windsor and the three Chapels Royal, ‘without prejudice to their status as Royal Peculiars' reported in March 2001. It wanted to preserve the Peculiars’ independence, but with the introduction of good practice from other institutions. Its major recommendation was that the role of Visitor at St George's Chapel should revert to the Sovereign and that the Sovereign and the Lord Chancellor should delegate their Visitorial functions to a Standing Commission of between three and five people. The Commission, which would make an annual report to the Visitor, would receive the annual budget, audited accounts and strategic report from each institution. It would act as an advisory body and where possible, mediate disputes and act for the Visitor in disciplinary matters, whether secular or ecclesiastical, and investigate complaints. Other recommendations included appointing two lay persons, one with financial experience, to the Chapters of Westminster Abbey and St. George's.
On 9 February, Lord Falconer announced instead that independent Assessors would be appointed for each Royal Peculiar, both to give advice and to consider serious grievances where all normal channels had been exhausted. Assessors will not have the Visitor’s power to make binding determinations but may recommend how a dispute might be resolved. If that fails, the complainant may approach the Queen as Visitor. She will then seek advice from the Secretary of State who, if appropriate, will establish a Group of up to three Privy Counsellors to whom the Queen will delegate her Visitatorial jurisdiction to make a final, binding determination. In addition, each Peculiar will in future report annually to Her Majesty on its stewardship and the events that have occurred during the year, and submit annual accounts.
Frank Cranmer
Personal Data – Who needs it?
A brief review of Durant-v-Financial Services Authority
On 8 December 2003, the Court of Appeal handed down its judgment from the appeal of Michael John Durant. He had requested under section 7 Data Protection Act 1998 (‘the Act’) that the Financial Services Authority (‘the FSA’) disclose all personal data concerning him stored both on computer and on manual files. The FSA disclosed the data held electronically but declined to disclose the information held manually on the grounds that the information sought was not ‘personal’ within the definition of ‘personal data’ in section 1(1) of the Act. Even if it was, the FSA argued, it did not constitute ‘data’ within the separate definition of that word in section 1(1)(c) in the sense of forming part of a ‘relevant filing system’. The Court of Appeal dismissed Durant’s appeal and in so doing, inter alia, tried to clarify what is meant by ‘personal data’ and a ‘relevant filing system’ under the Act.
Shortly after the judgment, the Information Commissioner produced a guidance note (available at the following link) concentrating primarily on the two main questions that arose in the Durant case:
- What makes 'data' 'personal' within the meaning of 'personal data'?
- What is meant by a 'relevant filing system'?
This clarification by the Court of Appeal significantly restricts the information that must be disclosed to an individual after an application under section 7 of the Act in respect of paper files. This will be of particular importance to church bodies, many of whose records are kept on paper rather than on computer.
Lee Coley
|
|
