One of our greatest cathedrals may have to close – thanks to Labour

On St George’s Day, Nottinghamshire Scouts parade to Southwell Minster to give thanks to the patron saint of England and the Scout Movement. Elderly ladies step out of the hairdressers with rollers still in their hair. Shoppers put down their baskets to watch the boys and girls go by. The parade winds past the Saracen’s Head, where Charles I spent his last night of freedom before surrendering to the Scottish army; and up to the Archbishop’s Palace, where Cardinal Wolsey spent the last months of his life desperately trying to win back Henry VIII’s favour after failing to secure the annulment from Catherine of Aragon.

On reaching the Minster, seat of the Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham, the Scouts form a guard of honour with the English, Union and Scout flags. Inside, they pack the nave and sing ‘Jerusalem’. Yet next St George’s Day parade may be Southwell’s last. Last week, the Dean, the Very Revd Dr Stephen Evans, told the Church Times that there is a £20 million black hole. Only when closing the 2025 accounts did the full extent of the crisis become clear.

If the money can’t be raised, the Minster will close next year. Southwell faces the ignominious fate of becoming the first Church of England cathedral to shut since the Reformation. Most popular Alexander Larman The sudden end of the World of David Walliams Ross Clark The US midterms prove that Donald Trump was right Madeline Grant Louise Haigh was just as bad as you’d expect at DPMQs Repairs have been continually put off, but can be put off no longer.

The electrics have been condemned, the roof is broken and water is pouring in. The Dean and 382 volunteers are urgently seeking to raise £460,000 to make the nave roof watertight. This will protect the building while many millions more are raised to secure its long-term future. Southwell Minster (locals say ‘South-well’; everyone else says ‘Suh-thull’) is one of England’s great Norman buildings. Its pre-Conquest origins are lost in history.

One version of events holds that St Paulinus, a Roman monk sent by Gregory the Great to convert the Anglo-Saxons before becoming the first Bishop of York, founded a church here while he baptised heathens in the River Trent. Another legend claims it was founded to house the relics of St Eadburh, the abbess of Repton and a 7th-century saint, which were moved from Derbyshire to Southwell to escape Viking attacks. Whatever Southwell’s origins, construction began in 956 when King Eadwig granted land to the Archbishop of York.

The new Saxon minster became the ‘mother church’ of the southern part of the diocese of York. Before parish churches, priests went out from a minster (from the Old English mynster, itself from the Late Latin monasterium) to baptise, preach and administer the sacraments to the surrounding people. Southwell was rebuilt by the Normans beginning in 1108, part of a national programme to demonstrate, to a recalcitrant people, the earthly power and divine favour enjoyed by their conquerors.

The present building consists of an eight-bayed nave, north and south transepts, a choir, chapter house, pepperpot western towers and a crossing tower. The nave is a pure example of the Norman style, with enormous pillars and round arches. Its original towers are a rare unity: Norman from top to bottom. The treasure of Southwell is the Chapter House, decorated with startlingly naturalistic carvings of leaves, animals and mythical beasts.

There are pigs eating acorns, a goatherd blowing his horn, and a green man with leaves growing from his mouth. These are perhaps the finest early English gothic sculptures anywhere in the country. The Revd W.E. Hodgson was right when he wrote: ‘Other churches may be older, a few may be larger, but none are more beautiful.’ Southwell survived the Black Death and the Reformation but it may not survive this Labour government. Rachel Reeves’s decision as Chancellor to abolish VAT relief on church repairs has created thousands of financial black holes for churches across the country.

Some had already raised the money, before discovering it wouldn’t be enough. Small parishes now need to raise tens of thousands more. Cathedrals such as Southwell face a tax bill running into millions. Some volunteers are simply giving up. These buildings do not belong to our bishops or ministers; they belong to us This is our greatest heritage crisis. The National Churches Trust reports more than 90 per cent of applications to the government’s new Places of Worship Renewal Fund have been refused.

Southwell was told the first grants would go only to the most ‘deprived areas’. The government seems to think churches in middle-class areas are undeserving of support. ‘We are in a town of 6,000 people,’ said the Dean. ‘That’s not a population able to support a parish church, let alone a cathedral.’ They need help. Where then is the C of E? Despite an endowment of more than £11 billion, the Archbishop of Canterbury seems too preoccupied with Project Spire, the ill-judged plan to fund £100 million for ‘reparatory justice’, to tackle the crisis facing churches.

The Bishops’ Bench in the House of Lords spends more time speaking up for welfare spending than for worship. These buildings do not belong to our bishops or ministers; they belong to us. They are where our ancestors were baptised, married and buried. They are our inheritance and we are duty-bound to pass them on to the next generation as they were passed on to us. What shame it would bring if they were to close on our watch. Just as the nation is entranced by the artistry of the Bayeux Tapestry, one of our greatest Norman buildings may quietly be shut.

That is a scandal. You can donate at: southwellminster.org/project/donate.