When tradition deserves a break

Upsetting a convention caused uproar, so is it right to break with tradition?

Yaroslav Walker

Yaroslav is Vicar of Christ Church, Hampstead.

A robed and seated man, in a speaker's chair talks and gesticulates.

The House of Common's Speaker.

Parliament TV.

“Nearly a quarter of a century has passed since a speaker of the Commons stood down from its high chair with dignity and to applause.” Thus wrote Andrew Rawnsley in the Guardian this Sunday. Last week the House of Commons erupted. An unedifying lava-spew of recrimination and anger flowed through the corridors of power as the Speaker of the House, The Right Honourable Sir Lindsay Hoyle, broke parliamentary convention to the seeming benefit of the Labour Party. Memories of his predecessors’ playing fast-and-loose with Parliamentary procedure pushed buttons. The SNP’s Gaelic fury founded a flurry of calls for the Speaker to step-down, and it was not until he gave a near-tearful apology that some calm seemed to be restored. Opponents cried foul - ‘how dare he upend the conventions of the House!?’ - while supporters jumped to his aid - ‘he was just trying to protect MPs from further harassment over the Israel-Gaza debate!’ - and everyone was unhappy…

The technicalities of this convention (that multiple amendments are not called upon for voting during an Opposition Day Debate) are less interesting to me than the fact that the convention exists. ‘Convention’ is another word for ‘tradition’. Traditions are important. Our famously ‘unwritten’ Constitution relies heavily on tradition, especially for the smooth running of Parliament. Rather than having the process of legislating and governing micro-managed with procedural minutiae, the Commons operate on the basis of nurturing and conforming to its traditions. In essence, the House of Commons operates on the basis of respect - by respecting the traditions of the House, Parliamentarians grow to respect each other as fellow followers of tradition. Exterior action builds-up interior disposition. Practice influences sentiment.

At least, that’s my romantic take on it. Traditions give some coherence to a society - from the society of elected MPs right through the society of a nation - and allow it to flourish. Traditions bind people together. Traditions unite. You may come from a different part of the country than your neighbour, have different family values, have a different religion or skin-colour or education-level, etc…but you can be united in the traditions you follow. Whether it’s having a roast on a Sunday, going to a Carol Service in December, singing Three Lions in a World Cup year, the traditions you share despite all other differences give you a common cause with those around you.

This is not to say that traditions can’t have a dark side. Some traditions can alienate guests. Some traditions can stifle creativity and innovation. Some traditions can be maintained purely to bamboozle the uninitiated for the benefit of those in the know. In extremis, some traditions can lead to groupthink, to the othering of those who don’t share them, to jingoism and hatred; St Paul wrote that it was the zeal for the traditions of his fathers than led him to persecute the first Christians. Traditions should never be taken for granted or left unexamined. Traditions are roses - beautiful and sweet-smelling, but always in need of pruning. But let the gardener prune carefully - you want some roses left for the garden.

When the scribes and Pharisees try to trick and trap Jesus with impossible thought experiments, they often quote their traditions. Jesus always wins the debate. He wins in the face of their traditionalism. He wins by being a radical. RADICAL! His radicalism is not marked by the abandonment of the concept of tradition, but by deep respect for it. The Sermon on the Mount is probably the most famous speech about the importance of tradition - “You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times…But I say to you…” - keeping the traditions of God in the face of the self-serving traditions of men. The scribes and the Pharisees are the White Witch to Jesus’ Aslan: ‘“It means,” said Aslan, “that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know. Her knowledge goes back only to the dawn of time.”’

Not every critic last week will have genuinely cared about the traditions of the House of Commons. Many will have mouthed the words but would have happily stood by if the breaking of convention benefited them. Nevertheless, we must take tradition, and it’s breaking, seriously. Traditions nurtures the relationships of MPs. Traditions nurture the relationships of neighbours and fellow citizens. Traditions nurture relationship with God, as the traditional rhythms of religious practice and Church seasons help order prayer and worship. Perhaps we’ll look back on the upturning of this particular Commons tradition and recognise it as the right rejection of an outdated convention…but let's be cautious. Traditions are important. Break them with care.

Article

Care

Comment

Mental Health

8 September 2025

4 min read

Suicide prevention cannot be done in isolation

Community response is needed, not just remote call-handling

Rachael Newham

Rachael is an author and theology of mental health specialist.

Three posters with suicide prevention messages.

Samaritans adverts.

Suicide is a tragedy that leaves devastation in its wake for individuals, families and communities - but it remains shrouded in stigma. Whilst those who die by suicide are grieved and mourned amongst their communities, those who experience suicidal thoughts or who survive suicide attempts are often dismissed as ‘attention-seeking’ or ‘dramatic’.

The truth is, our response as a society to suicide is one which often ignores those who are most vulnerable until it is too late. According to the UK Office for National Statistics, the number of people dying by suicide has risen steadily since 2021, and whilst some of this can be attributed to the way in which deaths are recorded, it also represents a real and urgent need to change the narrative around suicide and the suicidal.

As the need has risen, we have also seen that services seeking to support those struggling with rising costs and rising demand.

Just 64 per cent of urgent cases and 72 per cent of routine cases were receiving treatment within the recommended time frames and the proportion of NHS funding being allocated to mental health falling between 2018 and 2023 highlights that the parity of esteem for mental health promised back in 2010 seems to grow further away.

Against this backdrop, for over seventy years, the Samaritans have been synonymous with suicide prevention, working where the health service has struggled to be. It’s sometimes been referred to as the fourth emergency service and has been providing spaces, mainly staffed by volunteers, in person, on the phone and online for people to express their despair in confidence.

And yet earlier this year, it was announced that over the next decade, at least 100 of its branches would be closing, moving to larger regional working and piloting remote call-handling.

Whilst this might be an understandable move considering the economic landscape for the Samaritans, it risks not only a backlash from the volunteers upon which Samaritans relies but also reducing the community support that locally resourced hubs provide.

Suicide prevention cannot be done in isolation; it has to be done in and with community.

Even the most well-trained and seasoned volunteer might find particular calls distressing, and the idea that they would have to face these remotely, without other volunteers to support them, is concerning.

I think this needs to be a wake-up call, not just for the sector - but society as a whole. Because when it comes to suicide, we need to work together to see an end to the stigma and a change in the way people are supported.

Suicide prevention cannot be left up to charities, we all have a role to play.

It matters how we engage with one another, because suicide can affect anyone. There are undoubtedly groups within society who are at a higher risk (for example, young people and men in their middle age).

Still, nobody is immune to hopelessness, and even the smallest acts of kindness and care can help to prevent suicide.

In the Bible story of the Good Samaritan, from which Samaritans take its name, Jesus tell the story of a man brutally robbed and left for dead on the roadside. A priest and a Levite avoid the man and the help he so clearly needs, but a Samaritan (thought of as an enemy to Jesus’ audience) was the one to not only care for his physical wounds, but also pay for him to recuperate at an inn.

We need to have our eyes open to the suffering around us, but also a willingness to help. It probably won’t be by giving someone a lift on a donkey as it is in the story(!) but it will almost certainly involve asking the people we meet how they are and not only waiting for the answer, but following it up to enable people to share.

It might require us to challenge the language used around suicide; moving from the stigmatising “committing suicide” with its roots in the criminalisation of suicide which was present before 1962 to “died by suicide”, and shifting from terms like “failed suicide attempt” to “survived suicide attempt” so that those who must rebuild their lives after an attempt are met with compassion and not condemnation.

Above all, we need to be able to see beyond labels such as “attention seeking” or “treatment resistant” to reach the person whose hope has run dry, and allow our hope to be borrowed by those most in need, both through our language and our actions.

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