The Church of England said yesterday it wanted a swift relaunch of moves to admit women bishops, with revised plans put before its governing body at the earliest opportunity in July.

The 19-strong Archbishops’ Council said it wanted to resolve the situation “as a matter of urgency” after the General Synod, the governing body of England’s state church, failed to approve legislation in a November 20 vote, triggering turmoil.

The House of Bishops – one of the three houses of the Synod, along with the clergy and the ordinary churchgoing laity – will aim to put adjusted proposals before the next meeting of the Synod in July.

If so, the 470-strong body will hold a simple majority vote that if passed would see the proposals taken out to the 44 dioceses, of which 42 were in favour of women bishops last time.

Given enough support, the proposals would then come back to the Synod for a final vote on approving legislation – as happened last week, when it narrowly rejected the appointment of women bishops, sparking turmoil and setting back efforts to modernise the mother church of 85 million Anglicans worldwide.

In its biggest decision since backing the introduction of women priests 20 years ago, just enough lay members of the Church of England voted against the measure to bring it down, following years of wrangling between traditionalists and liberals.

Votes on legislation need a two-thirds majority in all three houses but narrowly missed the threshold in the House of Laity by just six votes.

The vote left the Church of England facing accusations that it was out of touch with society.

The C of E, which separated from the Roman Catholic Church in 1534, claims that more than 40 per cent of people in England regard themselves as members.