My Lords, I thank you for the opportunity to speak in this debate. I wish to offer some important perspectives from where the Church of England stands. For two years or more, Government Ministers have been in conversation with church leaders about the possibility of the church providing extensive welfare services, rather in the way that the church plays a major part in education. The new direction of the state, it seems, is to be a commissioning state, rather than one that has extensive institutions providing welfare.

Both Government and church are well aware that in the Scandinavian countries and Germany the church provides extensive welfare services. These countries have a church tax, which is paid by most citizens. The money received through taxation is returned to the church in support of its ministers, its buildings and in making possible the extensive welfare work done in its name. I admit that I have sometimes wished that we had a church tax in the United Kingdom. Because welfare provision in these European countries is long-standing, the arrangements for financial provision offer financial security to the church and its welfare institutions. The church is treated as a partner, and its work is trusted, rather than controlled.

The Church of England has very strong roots in local communities, making it well placed in many contexts to deliver quality services in a way that truly understands the local situation, which government departments may not. We very much want to be part of the discussion about the new opportunities that are opening up. We want to engage with the state in extending our considerable involvement in social care and community health provision. There is no single view in the church. In some quarters, present arrangements for partnership seem to work very well; in other areas, bishops and others have serious misgivings, based largely on their experience over some years of local projects in health and welfare, many of which the church has endeavoured to support or lead.

The Archbishop's Council has commissioned serious research on what the Church of England's response to the commissioning state should be. It is being carried out for the church by the Von Hügel Institute, Cambridge. We are pleased to say that it is well supported by Members from both Houses, Ministers and shadow Ministers.

On the main areas of our concern, my remarks echo points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. The first concern is best described as short-termism. Government-based funders will often fund a new project for only three years. As my Carlisle diocesan social responsibility officer put it to me, "Staff can spend one year setting up, a second year doing serious work and a third year searching for funds. The prolonged uncertainty can lead to the loss of key staff members". As a way of delivery to meet social needs, that is inefficient and totally inadequate.

There are better examples. The church is signing 25-year contracts for the new academies. Christian groups bidding to deliver dentistry are getting 20-year contracts. In all that, we are glad, but the picture is very mixed. Good social care needs long-term commitment, which we cannot emphasise too strongly. The heart of this debate is about the quality of delivery, not about the number of initiatives. Our second concern is goalposts and the tendency for them to be continually shifted. To quote my social responsibility officer again, "The Cumbria local area agreement was launched in April 2007 and was intended to last for three years. Government policy has changed with the publication of the local government and public health Bill. There is now a new single set of 198 measures representing national priorities known as the national indicator set and the only measures on which central government would access outcomes. Cumbria is now required to deliver a new local area agreement effective from 1st April 2008". The shifting of goal posts represents a serious deficiency in solid, proven, long-term strategy.

Funding is the third area of concern. The church's diocesan boards of education are statutory bodies with their own financial structures and reserves, so they are reasonably secure, but that is not so for social responsibility. New church institutions would have to be created either at a diocesan level or a national level if the church is to become a major welfare provider. It cannot be prudent to do this if the continuity of funding is liable to be insecure.

The Bishop for Urban Life and Faith, the right reverend Stephen Lowe, has been to look at Anglican church projects in Australia and Hong Kong, and the arrangements for funding are quite different from how things look here. That is central to the debate which needs to be held. If the church is to be a partner, it must be trusted by government and not controlled. As I perceive it, recent governments have found that very difficult. Church projects of course would be audited, but not controlled. My opinion is that, recently, we have been building a society that is very low on trust and very high on inspection and control—I see that, for example, in farming—which is very bad news for a healthy society.

The fourth area of concern, and in many ways the most fundamental, is the possibility of a clash of views in the spheres of justice and ethical values, and the implications that this would have if the church was the recipient of large sums of taxpayers' money for the provision of welfare. The church sees part of its role as challenging existing assumptions and values, and being an advocate for those with little voice or power. We must be about advocacy as well as about delivery.

In spite of huge areas of agreement on the welfare of our citizens, it is increasingly possible that differences could lead us into significant difficulty over, for example, protection for the poor or policies which challenge the Christian understanding of marriage. If the church chose to challenge certain policies and the values undergirding them, it could have government funding denied. Then it could be trapped in the unenviable position of making its staff insecure or having to go along with a policy which compromised the position required by its faith.

In conclusion, these are interesting and challenging times for the church. The nation is changing from a welfare state to more of a welfare society. The church very much wishes to be part of the discussion, but it also has serious concerns and misgivings, which need to be discussed frankly and addressed. It needs to be treated as a long-term partner which is trusted even when it wants to challenge the current effectiveness of delivery.