Transforming Wigan
The sad outcome of the experiment to turn Wigan’s parish churches into “hubs”
In 2014 the Diocese of Liverpool initiated a major plan for change in its Wigan deanery. At the time the deanery had 33 churches in 29 parishes but was experiencing declining attendance and falling giving. There was a substantial gap between the total parish share and the cost of clergy in the deanery. Parish clergy numbers were starting to be cut, being reduced in 2013 by 25%, from a figure of 24 (not far off one per church) down to 18. (As you will know, the Save The Parish campaign has made the point that the Church of England’s own studies show that cutting stipendiary (paid) parish vicar posts is a false economy which accelerates decline in church attendance and giving. Even the implementation team of a similar project at Launde in Leicester has described cutting clergy as setting up a “doom loop”.)
The ‘change programme’ – optimistically called “Transforming Wigan” – was funded at a cost of £1.2m provided by the Archbishops’ Council (from Church Commissioners’ funds). It was the first reorganisation scheme to be paid for through a programme known as “Strategic Development Funding” and acted as a pilot scheme. The stated purpose of the so-called transformation was to “establish a renewed Church that can flourish in worship, fellowship and outreach and can work as one body in Wigan to revive the spiritual heart of life.”
There was initial resistance to the plan at the stage when the scheme went before the Church Commissioners for approval (as reorganisation schemes have to do under the legislation: the Mission and Pastoral Measure 2011). Over 100 objectors expressed their reservations about the plans and their objections to the cutting of parish clergy jobs. These objections were overruled by the then-Bishop of Liverpool, Paul Bayes, and the Church Commissioners. The project went ahead.
There is a parish story on our website which describes the unhappy result: https://www.
The project struggled to gain acceptance and, as our Parish Story mentions, the Church Commissioners visited in 2019 but decided not to halt it.
Church Wigan – as it is now called – has been reorganised into 7 ‘hub parishes’ under a single team ministry deanery. The project has failed to reach its intended outcomes. The report suggests that the statistics suggesting missional improvement may not be reliable. The diocesan press release admits that it will be a major challenge to make the limited number of ‘fresh expressions’ and ‘new worshipping communities’ that have been started become sustainable. Meanwhile, the former 29 parishes have all lost their PCCs (with all their funds, rights and responsibilities) and stipendiary clergy have been cut to 13. Church attendance has fallen by a further 30%, donations have fallen by 30%, promised legacies have been withdrawn and the deanery debt increased to nearly a quarter of a million pounds.
The next stage is the consideration of church closures, with 19 already identified as being at risk of closure. There are also suggestions of combining the new 7 hub parishes into a single parish. As the former 29 parishes no longer have PCCs, they have no formal rights of representation on the issues that lie ahead.
Four documents summarise the current position:
- Fr Marcus Walker’s (Chair of Save The Parish) article in The Critic
- The Independent Report into Transforming Wigan
- The Church Times commentary on the Independent Report
- The Wigan Right Buildings Review