the anglican church is also a worldwide faith, but it is beset by divisions between progressives and conservatives. my guest today is the first black female bishop in the church of england, rose hudson—wilkin. is her church in danger of breaking apart? bishop rose hudson—wilkin, welcome to hardtalk. thank you. now, yours is a pretty extraordinary personal story. being raised injamaica in difficult economic circumstances and now holding a senior position in the church of england.

do you think thatjourney of yours affects the way you use the role of bishop? i hope it does in the sense that i can only operate from being me and being me is covered with where i'm coming from and certainly the journey that i have been on. so it will be veryjamaican. are you instinctively a champion of the underdog? passionately so, but i must say that it is wrapped up with the gospel because it is there that i am learning, that i have learned ofjesus�*s — his passion for those who are the underdogs, for those who are, you know, the last, the least, and the lost. and i don't see how i can but be

the same as a disciple of christ. interesting you say that, because i'm also very aware that we are sitting right next to one of the finest cathedrals in england — in a sense, a symbol of the power of the anglican church in this country. other symbols would include the fact that at the king's coronation, we saw that the relationship between church and state is so very intertwined in england. so, in a real way, you're part of the establishment now, and i wonder whether that makes you a little uneasy. no, i'm not uneasy about being part of the establishment. the church is established because of historical and constitutional reasons. you know, were we starting today, would we have done it that way? perhaps not, but that's what we have. and so we work with that. as an established church it means that people come to us for baptism. they come to us for marriages, they come to us for funerals.

perhaps not in the same huge numbers as they did way back then, but i think we still have a role to play in being the established church. but the status quo doesn't always have to remain the same. you can challenge it. giles fraser, a very sort of vocal anglican vicar, who's also a media commentator, he said this recently, "i believe in the disestablishment of the "anglican church, "not because it's the right thing for the country, "but because it would be right for the church, because we need "to exercise influence, not executive power." "we need to be radical. "we need to not pull our punches." do you pull your punches? i certainly don't pull my punches. and in the last few contributions that i can recall by the archbishop, i don't see, or i haven't heard him pulling his punches either with regards to immigration

and all those issues. so, i hearand i understand what giles is saying, and whilst i understand what he is saying, the question for me is, are we using it for good or are we simply using it to collude? i don't think we're colluding, and sometimes i think it is good to challenge from the inside. i think we can do that effectively than standing on the sidelines shouting. interesting that you chose to mention immigration. we are sitting just miles from the kent coast and from the english channel. talk about relevance. totally relevant to your diocese... yes. ..for the people that you deal with every day of every week. hundreds of people try to enter england on that kent coast every day, pretty much every day. when the weather is good.

when the weather is good, using those small boats. the government says that it is working on legal routes, but at the same time, it has a duty to the people, not least of your communities, the ones you represent, it has a duty to ensure that the flow of migrants coming unauthorised on the little boats is stemmed. and the only way, they say, they can do that is to send a signal that if they come, they will be removed. and one of the ways they're going to be removed is they're going to be taken to rwanda, where any asylum claims will be assessed. i'm appalled by that. and the reason i'm appalled by this is since time immemorial, people have moved, people have picked themselves up, picked theirfamilies up and decided, you know, we're going to go there, where life is better. because that's the other thing that

i hear our government and others saying, they are not real asylum seekers, they are economic migrants. i'd love to remind the british that they were economic migrants when they went to africa, when they went to asia, when they travelled to the caribbean, they wanted to improve their lives. that's what these people are doing. so what i want our government to do, yes, protect our borders. but truly, why not work internationally, intentionally with other governments across the world, western governments to say, how can we help to make a difference? but you know that many of your congregants, the people who live in your area, support a tough migration policy. not so long ago, you said that they, in your view, "are fuelled by plain ignorance, a lot of it fuelled by the press". do you think it is either wise or fair for you to characterise your parishioners as ignorant? absolutely not.

and i think what i was saying was there is an ignorance in understanding. it was about how do we understand why people want to come here. but do you think, bishop, that you know better than them? no, it's not about knowing better than them. what i'm saying is, you know, time and time again, i hear people say, "oh", you know, "why are they coming here?" etc. people do not understand their own history. and part of their own history is that the british went there. the british went there and taught the english language. so people feel a natural affinity and connection. they already have families here, etc. and so, for me, when i talk about ignorance, i'm not saying people are ignorant. i'm saying people do not understand the connection with britain that britain have with the rest of the world. but what they may understand is that their doctor's surgery is overflowing with people and they can't see a doctor, that their schools are too full and,

frankly, that sometimes their own security in their villages, their towns feels, in their view, threatened by the numbers of incomers who, in many cases, don't have work. isn't it interesting...? can you not understand that perspective? isn't it interesting that it's only for the brown people that we hold those views? i don't hear people saying that about the ukrainians coming or even the hong kong chinese people coming. isn't that interesting? i find it interesting. and you can... do you think this country is, still racist? i don't want to have that sort of polarised, it's simply about racism. but there is something happening. why is it that we have consciously created a system whereby we ask people to open their homes for the ukrainian refugees who, i think, i'm delighted

that we have done it? it's awful what is happening in ukraine. it isn't that people can't see what's happening in sudan, can't see what's happening in syria, can't see what's happening in third world, so—called third world countries. but there is something, and i don't want to say that it is purely fed by the media, but there is something happening about you being different from me. and so you're not really like me. so whereas i can open my door and welcome someone else who looks like me, who is european, so they understand our way of being, the very language that one of our parliamentarians used — they are "cannibalising" our country. that is simply outrageous. let's talk a little bit more about race. i mean, i talked about your extraordinary personal story. one glass ceiling that you broke here in england is that

you were appointed as the first female black bishop in the church of england. and yet we look around the key institutions of this country and we can call the church of england one of them, and still, frankly, most senior positions are not held by people of colour. the numbers are slowly coming up. slowly. but the archbishop of canterbury just a couple of years ago said that he had to apologise. he felt shame that the church was, in his words, still deeply institutionally racist. has that changed ? i think it is changing. it is changing. and, you know, iam not sitting here because i am a bishop saying on behalf of the church that it's changing. i am part of the archbishop's commission for racialjustice. so we are working at it. and so what i see at the moment is a real commitment to change. if i may, this is across institutions, this discussion, and you have very interesting

experience because you were a chaplain at westminster to the speaker and to mps. you were also a chaplain to the queen in the royal household. when we talk of institutional racism, with your experience, would you say that even in the royal household, even at westminster, there is still institutional racism? we talk about something being institutional. and the reason why we talk about it being institutional, it's because it's notjust about you or me deciding to be racist against someone. you look at the whole picture. and so, yes, if we were to look at the whole picture, the message that we would be saying is, can we ask why we do not have more people that reflects great britain in leadership in all the various walks of life?

but if i may, you were an insider to a certain extent in the royal household for a while. you know very well that the story of harry and meghan involved, ultimately, a deep disquiet that harry and meghan seemed to feel about the way she was treated as a mixed race member of the royal family. looking back, do you believe there were missteps that were made inside the royalfamily in the treatment of meghan? i'm not going to comment on that. and the reason i'm not going to comment on that is that you mentioned about me being inside the royal household. i was not really inside the royal household. i was a chaplain to her majesty the queen. and there were 20—odd of us who acted in that role. from that perspective, i personally do not know and cannot say for a certainty. and so i would not comment.

and i would do this for anyone else. if i didn't know, then i wouldn't make comments about it. let me ask you about something for which you very much have an inside perspective, and that is the workings of the church of england itself. does the church of england, when it comes to safeguarding, when it comes to dealing with a legacy of accusations of sexual abuse by people inside the church of england, does it have a real problem with accountability, with confronting its own past? i'm going to say no to this. and the reason i'm going to say no is i've been a bishop since 2019. and so by virtue of being a bishop since 2019, i have sat in on the house of bishops meetings and college of bishops meeting. and what i see, what i genuinely see is a real deep commitment to ensure that the church is a safe space

and a safe place. if the commitment is that deep... yes. ..how come the church hierarchy has just fired two members of a three—person independent safeguarding board, which was set up after an inquiry into child sex abuse inside the church, an inquiry which concluded that the church had, to a certain extent, offered safe haven to abusers? this safeguarding board, which was to work with families to ensure that would never happen again, has now been disbanded. people around the country cannot understand why. even bishops, your colleagues are saying that it represents a church which seems less safe.

this is the bishop of birkenhead, julie conalty. "a church which is less accountable." "i don't," says bishop conalty, "entirely trust the church today." i do not agree with bishopjulie. i really do not agree with her because what i see from experience here, we have a diocesan adviser, advisers, safeguarding advisers who are independent. they do not pull any punches with what they say. what i see now is a commitment to make the church a safer place. well, it must worry you, then, that one of the key advocates for survivors who talks to the families of survivors of sex abuse every day, andrew graystone, he has just said this: "the church "of england's safeguarding function is deeply "unsafe at this moment."

i don't agree. i really do not agree. and i don't think i'm living in a pie—in—the—sky world. what i can say with some, actually, with great certainty is that i see a church that is appalled at what has gone on in the past and the church right now that if you sneezed and it looks like a safeguarding problem, you are out. you know, that's what i see. so i don't agree with bishopjulie, i'm sorry. yeah, no... i want to ask you something very simple. do you think homosexuality is a sin? no. do you think it is right that... ..believing christians who are homosexuals are not allowed to marry, to celebrate their union in church? i would like to see the church get to a place where it is not obsessed with sex, frankly. and i think we are.

i would like to see two people who are committed in a relationship with each other, being able to celebrate the gift of love to each other. last year, archbishop justin welby, he affirmed the validity of a 1998 church declaration declaring that gay sex is a sin. given what you've just told me, was that a grave mistake on his part? well, the archbishop will need to answer for himself... but i'm asking you as a bishop... ..whether he made a mistake. i am saying that as a bishop that where two people are committed to one another, that i think the church ought to find a way graciously to receive them and to enable them to feel that they are human and part of god's creation. that's the answer... on so many levels, it seems

the church is tying itself in knots. i agree. not so long ago i interviewed... you agree? i agree. tying itself in knots. i agree with you. knots which nobody outside the church can understand. well, the church is tying itself in knots because the church is full of lots of camps. that's the problem. the church has this group here in this box, that group there in another box. and the church is falling over backwards to try and hold everybody together under the same umbrella. and isn't the truth that at some point people like you have to say, we can't keep tying ourselves in knots, trying to please everybody? we have to actually take some firm moral positions. and , is it not time, for example, to tell those leaders of the anglican communion in, for example, many countries in africa who absolutely not only believe that homosexuality is a sin, but in the case of uganda, have backed the government's new legislation, which actually

introduces the death penalty for homosexuality? isn't it time to say to the anglican communion in uganda, if you persist with that approach, you can no longer be in our church? i think the way we function as a church is to try and seek the greatest point of unity possible. so it's not... it is precisely that it is not a club where you are in and you are out. my take on it, and i want to be totally honest with you, and i am being honest with you, my take on it would be to say, this is where we are right now, and you must choose whether or not you feel that you can be a part of this. but this is where we are. isn't the truth, bishop, which you haven't quite said to me, but nonetheless is known across the anglican community,

that the real growing, rising power in the anglican community sits in precisely these communities in africa where the numbers of anglicans practising the faith is rising very fast? whereas in this country it is declining very fast. the balance of power within the anglican world communion is moving toward the conservative forces in africa. i would much prefer to be part of a remnant than to be part of something that is unloving, uncaring, and that tells me how to think. i hope that answers your question. i hope you hear what i am saying to you. we won't break the links. if they think that they can no longer be part of this, then that is entirely their decision as mature adults to decide. we won't break the links. jesus is asking for us

as a church to walk together, and so we will always strive for the greatest point of unity, where we can walk together. just... sorry. will there be people who will walk away and say, "we no longer respect you, archbishopjustin, or the church of england"? yes, there will be. that's their decision to make. we have not thrown them out. just one more point on this, because it's a very interesting statement from the most reverend dr laurent mbanda, who's chair of the gafcon primates council. now, as you well know, gafcon is the global fellowship of confessing anglicans. it is dominated by conservative elements within the wider anglican communion in africa. and he said this, "it seems the history of colonisation "and patronising behaviour of some of our colleagues "in the northern hemisphere toward the south, and africa in particular, isn't ended."

now, with your particular background, that is a fascinating thing to say about the anglican communion. i would say that they've gotten it wrong on this occasion. on this occasion they've gotten it wrong. and the reason i'm saying they've gotten it wrong is, as far as i'm concerned, there are huge numbers of pressing needs on the continent of africa. i have got to ask myself, why are they so obsessed on this one particular issue instead of the numerous issues that are killing their people? our people, my people. why? i don't understand it. could you, you personally, be a bridge builder between the different elements of this worldwide anglican communion? we've talked about glass ceilings and you breaking glass ceilings. is it possible for you to imagine, as we sit here in canterbury,

that one day a black woman bishop could become archbishop of canterbury, leader of this communion? i live in hope because as christians we are meant to have hope. i am not sure that the church is ready for that. how depressing. sad, isn't it? i'm not sure that the church is ready... why? that's a good question. i'm just not sure. bishop rose hudson—wilkin, unfortunately, we have to end there. but thank you for being on hardtalk. been a pleasure.

hello there. at the moment, the weather seems to be changing quite a lot, really from one day to the next. on thursday, we were in cooler, fresher air with some sunshine, a few showers for northern parts of the uk. but on friday the weather's going to look and feel quite different. there'll be a lot of cloud heading our way. it's going to be bringing a bit of rain and drizzle and it will feel more humid as well. and we've seen that cloud beginning to push in on a westerly breeze coming in from the atlantic into western parts of the uk and the cloud will continue to thicken, particularly on those weather fronts which will bring the rain in from the west. but we could start the day with some early sunshine across eastern scotland and eastern england. don't think it's going to last too long. the cloud continues to stream in on that westerly breeze and it's thick enough to give it

a little light rain or drizzle here and there. perhaps things turning a bit wetter through the day in northern parts of northern ireland and into scotland as well. and those temperatures are going to struggle with that cloudy, muggy air, 18 degrees widely, perhaps a little bit higher than that in east anglia and the south—east, but nothing special at all. we're going to find those weather fronts taking the thicker cloud and the rain and drizzle away in time for the weekend. and then around that area of low pressure, we've got the winds coming in from the west or north—west and it could be quite blustery through the weekend. strongest winds across northern areas. this is where we're going to find the showers. it'll be sunnier and a bit warmer further south where the winds won't be quite as strong. for many southern parts of the uk may well be a dry day on saturday, with sunny spells further north for northern ireland. also across northern england, southern scotland, more frequent showers in the north and west of the country where it will be particularly windy and temperatures

maybe only reaching 16 degrees in glasgow, warmer in the sunshine across the east midlands, east anglia and the south—east — 2a degrees here, not too bad at all. second half of the weekend, not too many changes. still some stronger winds in the north. we've got showers, perhaps longer spells of rain in scotland, a few showers for northern ireland and northern england. but further south, better chance of staying dry, again, and those temperatures getting into the low 20s. so we've got a real difference north south over the weekend. heading into next week. it's not a classic summer weather pattern because low pressure is going to be dominating that will bring some showers or longer spells of rain, particularly in the west.

seekers to rwanda is unlawful. welcome to newsday, reporting live from singapore, i'm mariko oi. the headlines. forty thousand police officers are on the streets of france, braced for a third night of violence, over the shooting dead of a teenage boy in paris. is this the end of affirmative action in america? the us supreme court rules universities must stop choosing students on the grounds of race the british government says it will go to the supreme court to challenge a ruling that its policy of deporting asylum

the british people no longer indulge the polite fiction that we