Dr Carey: "Employers have moral obligation to staff"

Archbishop Accused of Hypocrisy over Union Rights

In a ground-breaking speech - the first ever by an Archbishop of Canterbury to the Trades Union Congress - Dr George Carey said employers had a moral responsibility to recognise their employees' representatives.

His speech came hours before the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, addressed the Brighton conference and confirmed that the Government is to introduce new legislation giving unions the statutory right to recognition.

Lyons: claims clergy are denied union rights

But the Archbishop's comments provoked an immediate row, with one union leader demanding the Church put its own house in order.

Roger Lyons, general secretary of the Manufacturing, Science and Finance Union, said the Church had refused for two years to recognise his union representing more than 400 clergy.

"It appears the Archbishop is commending to others that which he himself denies his employees. Any neutral observer would surely smell the whiff of hypocrisy," he said.

Carey Under Attack from Tories

As the Archbishop stressed the links between the Church and the union movement, and rejected Thatcherite notions about market forces and about there being "no such thing as society", he also came under criticism from senior Tories.

Former Tory minister Ann Widdecombe said the Archbishop's words were "a recipe for unemployment", while another former Tory minister Patrick Nicholls criticised the Archbishop for giving a ringing endorsement to the union movement.