New general secretary for Bishops' Conference

The Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales have appointed Fr Andrew Summersgill of the Diocese of Leeds to succeed Mgr Arthur Roche as its General Secretary. Fr Summersgill will take up his new post at the end of the Low Week Meeting of the Bishops' Conference, 23-27 April 2001. Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, President of the Bishops' Conference, said: "I am very pleased with this appointment. I am sure Fr Andrew Summersgill has all the qualities needed to fulfil this important office. I take this opportunity to express the warmest thanks of the Bishops' Conference to Mgr Arthur Roche for his outstanding service as General Secretary over the past five years. We are indeed very grateful to him." Fr Andrew Summersgill was born in Bradford on 1 September 1962. He attended the local Catholic school, St Clare's, before moving on to St George's Comprehensive for five years, and then to Cardinal Hinsley Grammar School, now Yorkshire Martyrs. In 1980, he went to the Venerable English College in Rome, where he studied philosophy, theology and canon law at the Gregorian University. He was ordained priest at St Clare's in Bradford on 7 September 1986 and returned to Rome for further studies. He gained his licence in canon law in 1987, and then did a further year of study before returning to England. In February 1989 he was appointed to the parish of St Theresa in Leeds, where he remained until he became Secretary to Bishop David Konstant in September 1990. While holding this office he became Vice-Chancellor of the Diocese in 1991 and Judicial Vicar and Chancellor in 1995.