DIOCESAN STIPENDS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 77, 24 October 1942, Page 4

DIOCESAN STIPENDS

APPOINTMENT OF COMMISSION It was decided by the Anglican Synod in Christchurch to ask the president Archbishop West-Wat-son) to appoint a commission to report upon a proposal to abolish the distinction between parishes and parochial districts, and to equalise the stipends of the clergy with additions according to family responsibilities and local administrative costs. There was a long discussion of a motion by Archdeacon A. C- T. Purchas, who desired Synod to record that existing distinctions between parishes and parochial districts was undesirable, and that the principle be adopted that stipends in all cures should be on the same scale, with allowances based on the local administrative expenses, and with family allowances according to the needs of the individual clergymen. But the house eventually decided to favour the appointment of a commission by the Archbishop to go into the whole question. The Rev. W. E. Southward claimed that none of the parochial clergy was overpaid. In fact, in the majority of cases in the diocese, he said, they were underpaid. “The lowest stipends should at least be a living wage,” he declared. “and at present they are not.” Out of 57 cures in the diocese, said Mr Southward, 43 vicars were

paid £350 or under. Of that number 29 (or half of the total of 57), were paid the minimum of £3OO. Only six out of the 57 were receiving more than £4OO per annum. The Dean of Christchurch (the Very Rev. A. K. Warren) said that if Archdeacon Purchas’s original motion had been carried it would have resulted in a levelling down, not in a levelling up. After pondering over this question of stipends for some years, he said, the only solution appeared to him to be the collection of fresh money in order to increase the amounts that were now the appointment of a commission. This was supported by the Primate (Archbishop West-Watson), the Dean, and Mr Southward, and Archdeacon Purchas then withdrew his motion conditionally upon its being appointed.