Transferred Episcopal Arrangements (TEA) is the 'carrot' designed to appease traditionalists who threaten to drive a wedge through the Church if their needs are not adequately catered for. Under the proposals, jurisdiction will be transferred to the Metropolitan, with the 'episcopal ministry' being provided by a Provincial Episcopal Commissary (PEC) appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury or York. The PEC would exercise aspects of the Archbishop's authority over those parishes that had applied for TEA, including pastoral care, sacramental and disciplinary procedures and any matters relating to ordinands, while others would be delegated back to the diocesan bishop.

This is almost identical to the current system of 'flying bishops', technically known as Provincial Episcopal Visitors (PEV) who minister to parishes unable to accept women priests. This will mean the dismantling of the1993 Act of Synod which devised the current legislation.

The document declaring the bishops' approval of TEA as the most realistic way forward states: "It would enable the main body of the Church to proceed without the discriminatory provisions against women's ministry. It believes that it would offer the most satisfactory way of providing adequate pastoral safeguards for those opposed to the ordination of women bishops while at the same time maintaining the highest possible degree of communion between those with differing views on the question." But Anglo-Catholics are likely to be dismayed by the new plans and will see them as falling short of what is necessary to safeguard their future in the Church of England.

The Bishop of Guilford, the Rt Rev Christopher Hill, responsible for drawing up the report with two other senior bishops and a woman archdeacon, has been criticised for taking so long in reaching a proposal that is too similar to the status quo of 'flying bishops'. One bishop branded the new scheme as 'totally unworkable'.

He pointed out if an Archbishop was ever a woman, the PEC would have been appointed by a female, which many would find unacceptable. Further problems would now arise in making extra arrangements for another bishop to be the point of contact for the PEC.

He said: "TEA is not adequate ecclesiologically and is just moving the problem from the bishop to the archbishop. A diocesan bishop would not be satisfactory because he would be participating and party to the ordination of women.

So the archbishop would either be participating and party to the ordination of women bishops or he would be standing aloof from it, in which case he might as well belong to the free province." It would also appear from the report the Church of England has conceded that one day it might have a female Archbishop of Canterbury, a startling admission considering women bishops are not yet in place.

The document says that TEA would only work if 'special arrangements' were made 'in an event' of a female archbishop, but goes on to embrace the notion wholeheartedly declaring: "If the day comes when a woman is installed on the throne of St Augustine, it will indeed be a notable day in church history, and the continuing life of the Church Universal in mission." This, while revealing the Church's thinking at the highest level, marks a dramatic U-turn on earlier proposals to keep only men eligible for the posts of Archbishop of Canterbury and York.

In saying this however, bishops recognise the most fundamental problem of all; that many members of the Church of England would still not have accepted women as bishops and there would still be many overseas provinces in the Anglican Communion where women may never be admitted to the Episcopate.

As a result, the document calls for the Crown Nominations Committee (CNC) to be given the 'statutory authority in relation only to the see of Canterbury to take into account the acceptability at that point, across the Church of England and the Anglican Communion, of a woman archbishop.'

One bishop said of this: "There is no theology in the Crown Nominations Committee. It would be like saying whether a woman is appropriate for the presidency of an African country. The issue is whether this is possible, not whether it is a good idea." Women campaigners are liable to lambaste the power given to the CNC saying it is highly discriminatory. Overall reaction from the Church over the suitability of provision being prescribed in this report remains to be seen. One senior bishop dismissed the whole document as a 'fudge', adding it is written in 'impenetrable jargon'.

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