Last year the House of Commons' All Parliamentary Group on Faith and Society developed a ‘Covenant for Engagement’ – to support faith communities to work with local authorities constructively and effectively. The Covenant is a joint commitment between churches, other faith groups and local councils to a set of principles that guide engagement and promote open, practical working.
Under the Covenant local authorities commit to welcoming the involvement of faith groups in the delivery of services and social action on an equal basis with other groups. In return, It requires faith-based organisations to commit to working actively with local councils in the design and delivery of services to the public.
As Chair of the Assembly Cross Party Group on Faith, I am extremely keen to see a similar Covenant adopted by local authorities in Wales.
Whilst many have long recognised the fantastic contribution of churches, mosques and other faith communities to life in Wales, the ‘Faith in Wales, Counting Our Communities’ report published out by Gweini - the Council of the Christian Voluntary Sector in Wales - underscored their importance by revealing the sheer scale and breadth of that contribution.
The report found that religious and faith organisations contribute more than £100m in economic benefits to Wales every year and that around 40,000 unpaid volunteers do 80,000 hours of community work each week. In addition to volunteers, the groups employed a further 1,400 paid staff working around 23,000 hours per week.
It also revealed that faith communities play an important role in protecting our heritage by maintaining more than 1,600 listed buildings across the country helping to secure visits from 2.5 million people annually. Many Christian communities in particular were able to demonstrate a significant contribution to promoting the Welsh language and culture, with a third of churches and chapels in Wales holding services in Welsh and 800 hosting other Welsh language-based activities.
The study also concluded that faith groups provide accommodation for other non-religious local organisations - with more than 600 have their own purpose-built community centres and 800 others renting out rooms for a nominal charge - playing an important part in fostering grass roots music and sports.
The document provided clear evidence that faith communities provide a wide range of services to their local communities – including many that governments are not well equipped to deliver, such as hospital visiting, youth and children's work, social activities such as lunch clubs and coffee bars, marriage preparation and parenting courses, and support for the bereaved. However, many faith communities are already working in other areas of emerging need and opportunity, including the provision of employment training, alcohol and drug awareness services, and debt counselling.
Every day of every year churches, chapels, mosques and other religious congregations give unselfishly of themselves to communities throughout Wales, and do so in the ever-changing landscape of public services. A Faith Covenant for Wales would help to cement a respect for their efforts and provide a set of working principles to help us all get the biggest social benefit from of this partnership, as those public services continue to change. After all, organisations and the services they provide can only become stronger if we all work together.