Why are House of Lords clerics so anti-Tory?

The bishops can smell blood in the water. Sensing how badly the Conservatives are doing in the polls, the two archbishops and 24 bishops of the Church of England in the House of Lords appear to have thrown aside any pretence of political objectivity and impartiality and have pitched themselves all-out against the government. This has been building up since the advent of the Tory-Lib Dem coalition in 2010, but the way that the bishops have taken their gloves off in the present session of parliament is shocking.

Anglican bishops occasionally argue that they opposed the last Labour and coalition governments just as much as they do the present Conservative one, but consider these statistics. In 1999-2000 they opposed Tony Blair in 27.1 per cent of divisions on whipped business, which in 2000-01 dropped to 15.8 per cent. Gordon Brown had to face 50.4 per cent opposition in 2007-08, and 60 per cent in 2008-09, however. Sometimes, such as on the issue of the Iraq war or how long the police could hold terrorists without charge, the bishops would indeed oppose Labour, but it tended to be from the left.

The coalition government was heavily opposed by the bishops: by 74.6 per cent of their votes in 2010-12, 81.8 per cent in 2012-13, 83.5 per cent in 2013-14, and 78.6 per cent in 2014-15. Yet once the Lib Dems were no longer in government, they went into full-scale attack mode. In 2019-21 they opposed the Tory government 94.7 per cent of the time, and in 2021-22 it was 95.6 per cent. Even more ideologically aggressive in this present session, the bishops have cast no fewer than 274 votes opposing the government and only five in support, that is 98.2 per cent of the time. They are on the rampage.