I Can well sympathise with the frustrations of your contributors (If the Church has nothing to hide . . . , September 16) relating to the recent Industrial Tribunal case involving Miss Helen Percy.
It surely must be an anachronism of the very late twentieth century that a significant section of the adult working population - ie, the clergy - appear to be statutorily excluded from the current provisions of Industrial Tribunal legislation. This was ostensibly designed to protect UK employees from the potential vagaries of their employer.
What is not realised by the general public is that the clergy are not regarded as being employees of their Church, unlike secular employees. Indeed, the House of Lords (the highest UK court) has already expressly concluded that the relationship between a pastor and the Church is not contractual as the pastor is a servant of God rather than the Church.
In reality, the pastor is considered a mere ''office-holder'' - albeit an ecclesiastical one. That is why the Industrial Tribunal, in all probability, will have no jurisdiction over such a case.
I cannot comment on the details of this particular case, but surely it is nothing short of a scandal that, even if Ms Percy were to be 100% in the right in relation to her unfair dismissal claim, she (and any of her ministerial colleagues in similar circumstances) has no right of redress within the current IT framework. Why should her worker status discriminate against her rights compared to those of her congregation to whom she would minister?
In fact, my own union, MSF, which represents hundreds of clergy of various denominations in the UK, had previously run such a test-case, on behalf of an English priest, in order to determine the contractual status of the clergy.
So what's to be done to rectify this anomalous situation? Well, obviously amend current legislation. MSF has already drafted a response to the Government's ''Fairness at Work'' White Paper (which will eventually become an Act of Parliament).
This demands, on behalf of our clergy membership, that the medieval form of relationship with the Church hierarchy should be ended. Quite simply, they should have the same employment rights as everybody else.
Ian Fulton,
Regional Officer
(MSF Scottish Clergy Section),
1 Woodlands Terrace, Glasgow.
September 16.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article