One of the features of the Christ Church Saga is that there is now far too much information for anyone but the most assiduous individual to process. There are literally thousands of online pages of facts, speculation, claim and counterclaim. Most people will end up with only a subjective impression of what has been going on in the College and Cathedral over the past four years. Even if they arrive at a conclusion about what they believe to be the truth, few would be able to marshal all the necessary facts that would allow them to argue confidently either for or against the Dean. Ordering all the information in a way that will convince a third party of the stance we are taking is probably not possible for most of us. Having said all that, I am and always have been a supporter of Dean Percy. This is a position I arrived at based on a knowledge of his character over some thirty years, but also backed up through my, no doubt incomplete, study of the available online information. I know that by saying that I have to be extremely careful in how I present my supporting material. First, I know that writing on the topic can bring threats of legal action by the teams of lawyers actively protecting the College and the Diocese of Oxford. Secondly there is the question that I have already alluded to. I recognise that a supportive position requires a fluency in all the facts surrounding the case and this I cannot claim to have. Out of my study of all the massive amounts of material available, I find myself left with three outstanding questions. If I were to be able to find the full answer to these questions, I believe I would be a long way towards having an insight into what is, for me, the most interesting part of the Percy saga – the motives and feelings of those who persecuted him over four years. Reducing the whole Percygate saga into a reflection on the motives of certain individuals caught up in a nightmarish event, is not meant to be an accusatory rant. The story, however, lends itself to such speculation and questions. Perhaps the best we can do is to arrive at a place of puzzlement over the behaviour of otherwise highly intelligent human beings. I hope that, by pondering the questions I pose, my reader can perhaps be helped to have a new, more manageable, grasp of important parts of the story. Asking pertinent questions, even when we cannot provide complete answers, is surely a valid way to penetrate deeper into the truth of what has been going on in Oxford over the past few years.
My concern in asking questions about Percygate is not to uncover new facts but to understand a little better the dynamics of the affair and how it was set in motion. There are episodes within the saga that cry out for explanations at a number of levels. Much of the time we do not have answers to these questions. We have only our surmise and speculation. The asking of questions is still a useful thing to do as it helps us to understand better. This first question I have centres around the original confrontation between the Dean and members of his Governing Body (GB) when a group led by the Christ Church Censors sought to remove him from his post for “immoral, scandalous or disgraceful conduct”. In 2019, in the course of this dispute, the accusation was taken to a formal Tribunal. Here a retired judge, Sir Andrew Smith, presided and heard 27 charges. . The hearing took place over 11 days in June and July 2019. When the judgment was given in August, it resulted in a near total vindication of the Dean. All the charges against him were overturned. My first question concerns the circulation of this Smith report. All the members of the GB were technically party to the prosecution of the Dean, but the group of Censors and ex-Censors, overseeing this prosecution, decided that the report should not be read in its entirety by all the members. The redacted version that they were allowed to read omitted mention of the misbehaviour of certain individuals and also left out an appendix 5. Here Sir Andrew had spelt out the details of unpleasant, even vitriolic, e-mail exchanges between certain members of the GB about the Dean. Members of the GB were explicitly forbidden to read the full unredacted version later forwarded to them by Jonathan Aitken. They were instructed to return their copies unopened and unread. My first question is simply this. What were the grounds which led the committee of Censors and ex-Censors to believe that it was right or just to make this demand of the GB? In issuing such a prohibition, the Censors seemed to be treating the wider GB as children, children who could not be entrusted with sensitive information. Whatever the detailed answer to my question might be, it is clear that the Censors and ex-Censors, the dominant clique in the GB, wanted to ensure that they were in control of the flow of information within the College. This single episode in the whole saga reveals an aspect within the story that puts these Censors in an unfavourable light. Whenever important information is denied to those who have a legal right to see it, we are likely to suggest that there is here little regard for justice, transparency and proper process. Evidently power games are being played out rather than the neutral pursuit of justice.
The next question I have to ask comes from a later stage in the whole process. It is at the point after the accusation of improper behaviour has been made against the Dean in October 2020 over what is commonly summarised as ‘Hairgate’. The allegation against the Dean was responded to by both the Church and the College authorities. Because of the accusation, the Dean was required immediately again to cease his duties in the cathedral and College. The Church process required the taking out of a CDM against the Dean. As part of the procedure, an independent reviewer, Kate Wood, was brought in to make a factual report and also recommendations to the Bishop and the NST. My second question does not focus on any of the interviews with the complainant or the Dean but on one particular aspect of the CDM process. A CDM requires that a risk assessment be drawn up. This will set out the conditions under which an accused person should be managed, pending some kind of hearing. Somebody – it has never been established who – produced a most extraordinary document which was meant to set out the risks posed by the Dean. The document has the hall marks of being an inhouse piece of work. In this risk assessment, the writer appeared to believe that the Dean was a danger, even a potential sex predator, to every individual working in in the College. Overnight he was prevented from having any contact with a single person in the College on the grounds that he was a danger to them. My second question is not about the authorship of this extraordinary document. My question is simply this. Who within Christ Church, the diocese of Oxford, the Bishop’s staff and the safeguarding team actually believed in the contents of this document and that it in any way reflected reality? It appears that this risk assessment was ‘approved’ by the entire diocesan staff, in spite of its murky origins. It is hard to see how anyone close to Christ Church or the Diocese had any reason to suppose from the available information that the Dean was a danger to anyone. It has been pointed out that the Bishop had the authority to seek help in drawing up a risk assessment which would be uncontaminated by either the politics of the Cathedral or Christ Church. Instead, the Bishop stood by this homemade document of doubtful provenance. I am told that there are ten qualified people in the Oxford area able to do this work of risk assessment. As we all know, the subsequent judgment by Dame Sarah Asplin declared that the alleged offence, if it took place, was not overtly sexual and did not merit a Tribunal process. Dean Percy had never had other accusations made against him of sexual misbehaviour. We are left unable to explain how a group of Church officials suddenly became caught up in an extraordinary group fantasy. This postulated that there was among them a sexual predator of such rapacity that everyone in the College and Cathedral needed protection from him. The results of this calumny have been seriously harmful and far-reaching to the morale of the Cathedral and the whole diocese.
The final question is about the future. When, at some time in the future, the full story of the Great Persecution is told and the details of the motivations and the skulduggery uncovered, we might hope for the wounds to begin to heal. In the meantime, we await the arrival of the forces of reason and justice, perhaps mediated by the Charity Commission. Their verdict would do much to tidy up the terrible legacy of this affair. One thing is certain is that the reputation of individuals in Christ Church and the Church of England has been badly damaged. It is also apparent that some individuals have allegedly behaved in a truly wicked fashion, leading to a major scandal which will take decades to heal. My final question is this. Is the Church of England prepared to use its considerable powers under the Clergy Disciplinary Measure to sanction and discipline its clerical members if they are shown to have been involved in gross misbehaviour towards the Dean? Spite, malevolence, and jealousy all seem to play a part in the saga, alongside a kind of group insanity. The Church has a duty, if it finds this kind of irrational bullying, to show its displeasure and demand sanctions from those found to be guilty. Some are also calling for an Archepiscopal Visitation to the whole Diocese of Oxford, like the one carried out for Chichester in 2011. The nature of the alleged misbehaviours may be different, but their effect, in terms of weakening the reputation of the entire Church of England, is comparable. If the Church at the highest level ignores what has happened in Oxford, that will be one more nail in the coffin for the reputation of the Church in the wider society.
For further fresh insights into the affair, please consult the Nineveh Website. https://nineveh.live/?page_id=75
Two further questions:
1) would you recommend to young people you know, to apply to study at Christ Church Oxford?
2) would you willingly submit to the leadership of the diocese of Oxford if you were looking to work there as a clergy person and if you did work in this diocese and encountered difficulties, what is the probability of your being treated fairly?
Whilst I agree with all the above , there are so many other unfathomable issues in this sorry saga. For example the notorious letter signed by 45 (I think) members of the GB to the Charity Commission saying that MP showed a “consistent lack of moral compass, and that he is not fit to remain a trustee”. Did they each really believe that ? were they coerced? or did they just go along as line of least resistance? . (Attempts to elicit individual viewpoints were ignored by all). Of course the Censors always insist “there is no cabal”. And one other depressing fact : despite several prompts from MP supporters , the student body / JCR refused to support the Dean. Indeed they were instead motivated to pass a motion against him over his “suffering” essay. (and I gather a small LGBTQ contingent protested against him when the Chancellor paid a visit.) (We suspect following the cabal’s PR company stirring things).
Thank you Alan for these questions. There are numerous anomalies in the story. At every point in the story, one observes crowd behaviour rather than that of individual conviction. The opposition to Martyn seems to be in every case tribal/political in nature. I too was puzzled by the attitude of the JCR. You expect the young to sniff out who are the underdogs and who are the bullies in a given situation. The politics of LGBTQ are somewhere in the mix but I have not unravelled them.
Three questions for the Christ Church trustees. (1) How many millions of the charitable funds entrusted to you did you spend on legal fees, PR agencies, detectives and so forth in pursuit of your disputes with Martyn Percy? (2) Were you aware that those funds had been given to you in trust for quite different purposes? (3) What justification do you give for the people from whom you solicited those funds to for the way in which you spent them?
There was a time when having been to Oxbridge, was considered an excellent notch on the CV, and to the ultra competitive, which particular college you attended, even more so depending on which it was. So, for example, people were a bit sniffy about Robinson College Cambridge, I think it was back in the day, owing to its relative newness or modernity. I’ve no idea how things stand nowadays. However I did note the esteem CC was held in, and its illustrious alumni were part of the cachet.
Maintaining brand CC is part of the groupthink going on here. The young are just as capable of putting careers before people. Moreover they have more to lose. Fancy having your brand’s image ridiculed in Private Eye or the establishment newspaper The Times. It’s not a good look.
Group decisions are notoriously difficult to reverse, as we are seeing in the political arena at the moment. A decision taken en mass is often different from a decision taken individually without coercion.
There’s also a sense of institutional indignation going on. “How dare this upstart outsider question our ways?”
Readers of Colin Dexter’s novels and followers of the tv series including sequels and prequels (with other writers) may have thought the plot backgrounds grossly exaggerated with respect to their denigration of academics and clerics. Perhaps they were closer to the mark than we thought?
“However I did note the esteem CC was held in, and its illustrious alumni were part of the cachet.”
On the whole, I think that the ‘esteem’ was often generally more social than intellectual: the oft-remarked prevalence of Christ Church prime ministers and viceroys was chiefly due to it being a ‘pop’ college for Eton (significantly, the last Christ Church prime minister was Alec Home). As I have noted before, Christ Church’s sister foundation is Trinity College, Cambridge. Until the latter developed Felixstowe as a container port, the resources of the two colleges were roughly comparable. Yet the intellectual accomplishments of Trinity were far ahead of those of Christ Church, and Trinity (and, to a lesser extent, St John’s) had dominated Cambridge for centuries, whether in the mathematical tripos or otherwise, vastly more than Christ Church ever dominated Oxford.
There have been times when Christ Church has held its own as an academic society (as under Fell or Aldrich). Under Cyril Jackson it was in the van of the reformed final examinations (Robert Peel being the template), but that fillip soon faded. During the inter-war period its reputation rose again under deans Strong, White and Williams. However, during the 1970s and 1980s its reputation had fallen again, and it was – once more – viewed as a finishing school for well-connected Etonians, often languishing near the bottom of the Norrington Table (to which it has apparently now returned). Indeed, some of the dons viewed it as their duty to train the class which they believed to be the future rulers of the nation. It was only after some of those dons retired that the reputation of the college grew again, although it struggled to attain the heights of St John’s, Magdalen or Merton, despite its resources. It took at least a decade to slough off the reputation of it being a repository of brainless, titled (and entitled) hearties.
I suspect its reputation will now have been stained for another half-generation. Significantly, the reputation of Oxbridge in general has fallen, even as those universities have increased outreach, along with the premium accorded to having a degree. School leavers are, I think, becoming less predictable in discerning what they think will advantage them over their lifetimes. Hopefully careers advisers and HR departments will become more flexible. If I had charge of anyone studying for A-levels, I would be steering them in the direction of STEM-based vocational courses and/or industrial apprenticeships, and would tell them not to waste their time and money on a degree, especially one in the humanities. If people want to educate themselves in the humanities they can do so on their own time and for pleasure; if they do so, they might soon find themselves rather better informed than many humanities graduates.
Wilfred Bion was instrumental in aiding our understanding of group dysfunction (Experiences in Groups 1961) and many others have built on his work.
He distinguished between “work groups” which were doing the job [the organisation was] intended for, and dysfunctional “basic assumption” behaviour such as fight/flight. Sometimes it’s easier to understand Bion’s ideas by looking at what’s going on and comparing it with what should be happening.
What on earth is Christ Church College doing scrapping and fighting with a scapegoat, reckless as to its negative publicity for so long? The real work of Oxford, may I argue, is the brilliant, timely and lifesaving introduction of the Covid vaccine, and things like this. I was immensely proud of their work.
Similarly what is the true work of a cathedral? Curing souls surely, not having hissy fits and suing other clergy.
Fighting like this means you’ve taken your eye off the ball, forgotten your calling and are fleeing your true, often difficult work. Work it must theoretically be said, Oxford has the talent to staff.
How is it that institutions go astray like this? Froghole’s illuminating comments suggest a plausible cause, in the decline in CC’s status within the university. For me as an outsider looking in, there does seem to be a good deal of grandiosity, which of course is a narcissistic defence. In essence, we defend against our loss of face by puffing ourselves up and pretending still to be great and gathering round our inner crowds of sycophantic mirror polishers. The narcissism maps onto the basic function behaviour. I’m not sure which is worse. Certainly one feeds the other. When you find a top performer in any walk of life, they are often the last ones to be singing their own praises, whilst the converse is often true.
Part of the problem for underperforming institutions is the very thing that once made them great. Past glory becomes embedded in a cumbersome structure. Often literally the glorious buildings symbolise what once was long after God has left the building. Bloated hierarchies maintain their privileges and wealth out of sync with the performance of the Body. This corporate obesity adds a dead weight to carry, hampering a return to fitness in doing the actual job everyone seems to have forgotten about.
I risk being somewhat provocative ( and of course off-topic) , when I say this sounds reminiscent of our current Government!
Yes Alan! I’ve been trying and failing to avoid the comparison. However there is an instructive parallel which I do think is worthy of note which I term “policy inversion”.
Just quickly, without getting too drawn in, one of the things disarming the Opposition, is The PM implementing Labour policies such as tax increases and money for the hard pressed. His colleagues and voters don’t like it much judging by the Telegraph headlines. How can the other sides oppose that?
Similarly with the College, the arguably cynical championing of “safeguarding cases” hamstrings opponents using flaws in the system against them and almost leaving them nowhere to go. Who finds it easy to argue against a vulnerable young woman? Yet all the time they were bullying a man to serious ill health.
And the cathedral instead of being a beacon of light houses the “forces of darkness”, a complete reversal of expected policy.
But presumably a kingdom divided against itself will fall eventually, if it hasn’t already.
As a former university chaplain, I know that intellectual excellence in an individual or group is no guarantee of emotional intelligence or psychological maturity. In fact, the long years of intense focus on one area of study almost seems to militate against achieving reasonable balance in other areas of life, and a sense of proportion generally. I’m reminded of Henry Kissinger’s observation that the reason academic disputes are so bitter, is that the stakes are so small.
So the malcontent dons’ undoubted academic qualifications are absolutely no guarantee of their behaving like reasonable, intelligent adults.
As an aside, I had a tutor at Wycliffe who had studied at Christ Church as an undergraduate. He recounted some of the ‘practical jokes’ he and his fellow students had played. These were positively sadistic: on one occasion, for instance, they had got an old live horse from the knackers’ yard. While a student was out they led the horse into his room and wired it up to the light switch. When he returned and switched on the light it was electrocuted. The tutor thought this was hilarious. I don’t know if the story was true, or if he was having us on, but either way it doesn’t say much for either him or the college.
I spent three extremely happy years as an undergraduate at Christ Church, 1968–71, followed by six formative graduate years during which I was a senior scholar and ‘lecturer’. It is distressing in the extreme to read about these shameful shenanigans. I look back, for example, on two Senior Censors whom I knew well, who happened also to be my tutors: learned, wise, sensible, cultured, decent people who couldn’t by any stretch of the imagination have behaved like this. Thank goodness they are not here to know about it. And among the GB then, there were of course some people with typically donnish foibles, but I can’t imagine even them stooping to this sort of puerile behaviour. We did indeed have a small clique of Etonians and Harrovians who once or twice made bonfires of their furniture or chased each other round the college with fire extinguishers, and who quite liked to throw each other into the Mercury pond in the quad, but they were a tiny — and derided — minority. Most undergraduates were serious about something — not necessarily their studies! — and behaved sensibly. It was not a finishing school then. There were numerous grammar school pupils who were by no means posh, such as a friend of mine who’d never had his own bedroom before. I don’t see myself ever having anything to do with the College again, which means forgoing alumni events at which one might see some old friends for the last time. It seems to me that a generation born in the sixties or seventies and raised under Thatcher has moved in who see academic work as simply a means of being big fish in a small pond and care nothing for the ideals that used to animate university life.
There must be at least one person, senior in ranking, of substance and resolve, who wasn’t party to what was done to Percy. They may have had to keep their own counsel up until now, but seeing the wrong done to him and obviously the damage to the reputation of the college, is thinking about whether now is the time to step forward and make their position clear. Risky of course. But someone needs to start putting things right.
I am sure that asking questions (rather than proposing solutions) is the way to approach the matter – as Stephen has done. Proposing solutions is to invite knock-down dismissals based on technicalities. The hard questions will not go away. Somewhere in his essay Stephen refers to treating people like children. That is often the way of officialdom or those who think they are secure in their positions. I find the way to combat it is to stick rigidly to the difficult question which clearly arises from the facts. (My wife once attended a meeting and afterwards said she wished I had been there. “Why?” “Because,” she said, “you would have asked an awkward question which would have brought the whole house of cards down.” That is what we have to do!)
I agree.
Difficult questions must continue to be asked and raised publicly so that even if silence ensues (which is standard CofE response) the questions themselves remain and do not go away. The launderers who manage the Church’s shame and embarrassment have trained their clients (dioceses, bishops, Lambeth Palace, etc) to operate the mechanisms of silencing and diversion. But in the face of this silencing there is much unease across the Church and a clear sense that much malevolence was allowed to pervert the Church’s safeguarding processes and that lawyers and laundries grew fat from the circus.
Oxford Diocese has questions it seems to want to avoid. Apparently they sent Diocesan Synod members a link to the Christ Church statement
https://t.co/Aa4kC43FOr
on ‘Percygate’ …
but not a copy of the ‘Refutations’ which can be found here:
https://t.co/3np0iCw5m0
What is the Diocese so keen to hide that they align themselves with Christ Church in this way? Why are they so keen to silence the claims by Martyn Percy of bullying and corruption? Do they not see that everyone can glimpse the Emperor’s New Clothes in the diocese and its bishop?
So much daylight is needed.
There have been some really helpful insights in the comments after this blog. Some of these bring us close to the central issue – why rational people appear to behave irrationally in certain situations. Steve Lewis’ points about narcissism and the links to Bion are especially interesting. Together I believe we have made something really useful for those studying the Ch Ch affair. I am privileged that my blog attracts such informed comment. I hope that all readers will take note of these important insights. I certainly have.
“why rational people appear to behave irrationally in certain situations”
As often as not people behave irrationally when their amour-propre is offended, and it is most frequently offended over issues of pay and rations.
I have long felt that Percygate was a pay dispute which got absurdly out of hand, although I appreciate that is perhaps a crude and reductive way of looking at it. The dons appointed someone whom they thought would be pliable and in their debt (as opposed to being in the debt of some remote politician). Dr Percy proved not to be pliable.
Dr Percy then asked for a pay review in the context of stagnating academic salaries and rising housing costs. That brought out a lot of noxious feelings about the worth of Dr Percy relative to other dons, who not only felt somehow threatened by him but who felt that their academic worth was greater than his (whether that is the case or not, or whether it matters at all, is another issue). All of the subsequent invective struck me as being a cloak for a problem that was, arguably, even more sordid than anything to do with stabbings, hair, showers, rudeness, etc.: namely the relative worth – in financial terms – of the contestants in this unequal duel, and who is to determine that worth.
Then there was the issue of sunk costs, which grew in parabolic terms the longer the dispute continued (indeed, the sunk costs compounded, in a sort of malign negative compound interest). Rather than accept a ‘total loss’ in both financial and reputational terms, it became essential for both parties to believe that they had ‘won’ something (just as it will be in Ukraine where, despite the protestations of the MSM, the principals *are* acting rationally).
Seven or eight times out of ten workplace disputes get really bitter because of money; radix malorum est cupiditas, etc. Most of the rest is camouflage for wounded self-regard over relative rates of pay. How many executives are ousted in the private sector over sexual peccadilloes or peculation or by means of boardroom coups, when the real reason is buyer’s remorse on the part of boards of directors who recognise that the executive in question is being paid more than his/her current perceived real worth, or has been wanting more money that the remuneration committee has really wanted to disburse?
Of course, money is power, and much of Percygate was about power: who is to exercise it in an institution that is always neuralgic about the relative status of college and cathedral, with the latter often being perceived as an excrescence, millstone or hang-over from the very distant past, when Church and university were one. If the story of the last 4 years has had any value, it is to illustrate that the existing 155 year old settlement between college and cathedral is only as viable as the people who sustain it, which is to say that it is not, and that it is now high time for a new settlement.
‘It would be wonderful if Froghole’s was the last word on this subject from which nobody, and I repeat nobody, comes out well.
Thanks Stephen
With regard to your second point I believe that at least one priest has withdrawn as an appointee on exactly the grounds you suggest. Second and perhaps more seriously, every ordination, licensing or institution requires an Oath of Obedience to be sworn to the Bishop (of the Diocese) and his/,her successors ‘in all things lawful and honest’ . These are legal oaths and part of the essence of the relationship between clergy and their bishop and I wonder how easily that all fits in this case.
When +Christopher Lowson was (albeit temporarily) suspended from Lincoln he apparantly hadn’t a clue as to the reason even though he was described by ++Justin as ‘a danger’. We’re not exactly on a level playing field here. I wonder if +Oxon should step down while his role in all this is probed.
Similar comment posted on Thinking Anglicans:
The ‘Refutation’ document in response to the recent Christ Church website statement deserves to be read by all CofE clergy and Synod members. If the claims made there are accurate, then serious questions need answers from Oxford Diocese, its bishop and cathedral canons.
https://t.co/Vx6ZobQ0ck
Only a judge or QC-led review can properly examine the scope of this with sufficient power to summon evidence from all involved, including the lawyers and laundries who helped weaponize Church of England processes across five years. A judicial figure is required with no connection to WSLaw or Nobody’s Friends.
A tweet on this was liked by Maggie Atkinson, Chair of the ISB. Oxford Diocese and Archbishops Council have commissioned this body to undertake a review into ‘Percygate’. Or rather the second half of the protracted Christ Church scandal.
Wiser minds than mine may be able to interpret this liked tweet by Atkinson. https://twitter.com/seaofcomplicity/status/1531615460772687872?t=D0Bn2d9nVUpcBBXHD1Jeog&s=19
This matters to clergy. Similar could happen to them. And it matters to survivors who are familiar with seeing the Church treat so-called ‘Lessons Learnt Reviews’ in less than honest ways. The remit of the ISB review has the appearance of a highly managed mirage. Has it been put together by Oxford Diocese? Or by the Nyebots in Church House? It will be a disaster for the newly formed ISB if they try to go ahead with a cynical reputational management manoeuvre planned by the Church in relation to a scandal which requires forensic application of questioning, document sifting, and truth seeking.
We have become too used to Diocese etc setting the remit for their reviews. I have just sent a long list of safeguarding failures together with documentary evidence to the reviewer of my Diocese. Instead of highlighting serious failures he seems quite unconcerned about them if they do not fall within his remit. I believe they do fall within his remit but should not a safeguarding consultant take action about serious systemic failures even if a Diocese has managed to produce a remit which would omit their failures? How do reviewers interpret their remits?. Are they able to produce glowing reviews even when told about failures? Or are safeguarding consultants duty bound to notify failures even the the Diocese has produced a remit to exclude them? So far my reviewer is only scanning the failures to see if the remit covers them.
Flippin’ ‘eck Mary! It’s one thing after another, isn’t it? I must admit, I was often surprised by the indifference shown by people who considered themselves not involved. No shock, surprise, sympathy or support.
I am so sorry you went through that, and it’s so sad that many others have too. Didn’t someone say safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility? Have finally been given excellent support by one Archbishop. I wish everyone could be treated the way my support person is treating me.
It’s in the CofE ‘s training document. Who is responsible for safeguarding? Everybody. It doesn’t happen. I’m stalking my Bishop, because he has to put it right.
Good luck with that, you will need it. Funny how safeguarding is the responsibility of everyone, even parishioners like myself who have never had any training,
yet somehow your Bishop, who received training appears blissfully unaware of his responsibilities. And surely a safeguarding professional who receives safeguarding allegations whilst reviewing a Diocese has a responsibility to act on the allegations? Or are they too permitted to remain blissfully unaware? I hope you feel able to persist, although as you are aware it will probably affect you adversely if you do. I do hope that a review into the Oxford debacle, about which egregious failings are in the public domain, will not be limited by a carefully worded remit which will not permit failings to be reviewed. If it is a battle to obtain a proper independent review in such a serious case which has generated a great deal of publicity and damaged a senior cleric to the nth degree, what hope is there in cases which are unknown to the public? I do hope enough senior figures speak out in the Oxford case so that a full review is carried out by personnel who are qualified for and experienced to undertake the task. Sadly you have to battle on alone. My best wishes and no doubt those of other readers go with you so you can succeed in persuading your Bishop to fulfil his safeguarding responsibilities. I have been unsuccessful with my Bishop, but you may succeed where I failed.
Thanks. I’m quite hopeful. And yes, the training does include what you’re supposed to do if someone discloses to you. Only they don’t. I’m holding back a bit because I know how busy and stressed he is! It’s certainly not in my interests for him to go, and I have to start again with someone else! He’s very nice, so I think once I get my foot in the door again, I might get somewhere.
Hello Mary,
Was the review of your diocese down to you battling on and being a nuisance or were there other contributing factors?
Though your review sounds dodgy I really, really want that to happen in my diocese, a review of the whole infrastructure not just an individual but however loud I shout no one listens.
From what you have said I don’t think we are in the same diocese so at least two god awful ones out there, how many more I wonder!
Hello Trish. I know what you mean, until we can get independent reviews of our Dioceses this seems the next best thing, and may get something done about your complaint. The fact we are not told about upcoming reviews, just in case we contribute (!) , then find reviewers are limiting our contribution so that they review only what the Diocese wants them to review does not make them independent safeguarding reviews in my opinion. I do not believe that if a safeguarding consultant does not want to review safeguarding failures because the Diocese does not want them to and have given a limited remit, that this counts as an independent review. It is time we drew attention to this, and other so called “independent” reviews such as the proposed review into the Oxford scandal and revealed them for what they are. I think it is vital to turn around the safeguarding reviews industry. Until we do that we will remain unsafe. However in answer to how it came about I have written saying that currently it is dangerous to be a complainant in our Diocese because the Diocese had me charged with reporting breaches of restrictions and summoned for harassing the DBF by using normal channels of complaints and that a police statement written by the Diocesan Secretary falsely claimed that my allegation against my former vicar was baseless despite the cdm proceedings upholding my complaint. I have written to many people and not taken no for an answer. I have written to the Lead Bishop for safeguarding, and any new safeguarding panel members. If you have not written to anyone before, I would suggest writing to everybody. Otherwise write back to the ones previously written to, then any new members who are announced and new safeguarding Bishops. It may be appropriate to write to Trustees, etc. I know from Diocesan solicitors that my blogging here is not appreciated, and my current Rector seems to read this blog as he stated, at the start of a communion service that what I said here are lies. In short it is the old story that unless others find your complaining becomes a nusuiance and an embarrassment to them, you will be ignored. I cannot say this is the reason for the review as the Diocese claims that after receiving a glowing Diocesan review, (about which I did not know and to which I did not have a chance to contribute ) they are essentially going the extra mile to ensure everything is as it should be. You are welcome to believe this but I do not. I have frequently trespassed on the patience of readers of this blog as often as possible (apologies to all) and this has certainly helped. It has taken a long time so don’t expect an immediate effect. I think it helps that I have excellent back up evidence such as a copy of police “tapes” showing I was repeatedly questioned under caution as to why (!) I reported breaches. Keep on repeating your case backing it up with evidence where possible. Then do it again. And again. Don’t accept no. Best of luck and good…
Wishes. Take care.
Thank you Mary, I did previously follow your example and write to trustees and got a really stinky reply but then I showed that reply to some clergy who have questioned the diocesan structure and who were not impressed. I have a social worker, no police, and she is getting fed up with them.
I will keep going as you suggest, do let us know if you feel the review has any impact at all. They are always so smug and act like they are doing you a favour when they actually get paid massive salaries for just doing a job, badly, in some cases.
Well done anyway for pushing things that far I am impressed 🙂
If this review publishes my contribution in a manner which does not minimise my complaint unduly, I will readers know. I am still waiting to see the review into Lambeth Palace to which Kenneth and I contributed. However as both reviews have remits limiting the reviewer, paid for reviews cannot currently look at the whole picture. I agree with Trish that the whole structures need to be reviewed. What is the good of half a review? We will see.
In the previous comments there was allusion to safeguarding’s being everyone’s responsibility and to a Vicar’s announcing in church that a contribution to this blog was a pack of lies. My interpretation of current concerns and assumption of responsibility is that every one of us must speak up when positions of trust are abused; there is far too much prevalence of a nothing-to-do-with-me attitude. About four or five years ago I attended an Easter Eucharist in a cathedral. The Diocesan was present, preached, and then, at the end of the ceremony, embarked on a denunciation of unspecified persons who had obstructed his wish to appoint an acting Dean with behaviour (unspecified) totally inappropriate to a Christian community. It was not my diocese and so “nothing to do with me”. I wrote at length to that Bishop, pointing out that there was no reason at all why I, a visitor, should be embarrassed by such a speech, and, moreover, that in making an imprecise charge targetting unspecified people from his exclusive platform he was abusing his position. It took a month to receive a reply. The reply was as as long as my letter so it had cost him a lot of time and thought. I was not surprised that it conceded nothing. It found fault in a rather condescending way with something I had written. I wrote back very briefly to thank him for his reply and to indicate that I should think again about the element he had highlighted. My conclusion to this is that I had hit the target. I think the long delay was accounted for by his trying to find something to criticise in my own letter! At the very least I had made him feel uncomfortable. I think it behoves us all to do what we can in whatever way open to us.
You’re right, and I wish more people wold do what you did.
I do recall an occasion when our diocesan, meeting a group of female clergy, gave a long-winded explanation of why female priests weren’t being given senior roles. It concluded with the statement that clergy structures have ‘one head and a long spine’. To which one of the women crisply retorted, ‘The spine isn’t much in evidence, bishop.’
Our leaders seem to be either spineless or bullies – or manage to be spineless bullies.
We should recall that bullying is, prima facie, a sign of weakness. Mary, Peter and others here show an excellent example of standing up to bullies.
Bullies, as we have discussed before here, are appointed to do the work even weaker others are too chicken to do themselves. By delegating the dirty work they hope to distance themselves from the ugly truth of what’s being done and hope that they can pretend it was nothing to do with them, when/if the reckoning comes.
I have written to the NST many times asking why feedback forms cannot be required by each diocese so that dioceses can clearly see where problems lie. Safe Spaces does this regularly and are required to report on the feedback to the Archbishops Council. Melissa Caslake pushed hard for feedback forms in her time in office to try and bring the church into line with other organizations offering people centred services.
So why do they consistently refuse and why are we consistently told they cannot ‘name and shame,’ if a diocese is failing surely it is in the interests of everyone, including them, to be given an opportunity to resolve issues and improve.
Good points Trish. Charities supporting disabled people like myself make this a high priority for obvious reasons. I am regularly telephoned and asked if everything is going well with the human guide who replaced my guide dog at mid week communion. And we are frequently asked to give our views on how services are provided and whether our needs are being met. The standards in a charity such as Guide Dogs are extremely high. Charities like these positively welcome critical feedback because the staff are dedicated to making our lives easier. They behave like persons with a vocation and put our needs centre front. They know they can’t improve without our contribution. Contrast this with the church which doesn’t want to hear any criticism however legitimate no matter what harm is caused to a person, or even a child. It is the brazen way the church is proposing a review which is not independent in regard to Oxford which says it all. We know you know that it won’t be independent, but we will probably get away with it as usual. And we know you know we will deliberately limit the remit in order to cover up as much as possible, but we have got away with it before and we hope to get away with it again. My hope is that people with integrity will wake up and refuse to take part and connive with processes which are unfair and unjust. And it’s high time that Dioceses stopped having reviews without telling the very people most affected in an effort to limit critical input. Having limited what can be reviewed, they enhance their chances of a positive review by limiting the number of contributions. It is time those involved in providing safeguarding reviews to Dioceses refuse to collude in limiting contributions in this fashion. It is time people realised that by taking part in processes such as these they are involved in helping the church to cover up.