by Martin Sewell
Just when you thought the CofE ( aka “ the Post Office at Prayer ) could not make things worse on the Safeguarding front, along comes Synod Paper GS2364 in which the Church’s Jay Review Response Group delivers only one clear message –
“ Hold my beer!”
Be under no illusion; this paper is an attack on the Jay review, its clarity, its independence, its call for urgency and above all its promise to put the victims and survivors first. The General Synod is not being asked to debate what is right about the Jay and the Wilkinson critiques, but rather to focus on how disturbing establishment group-think regards such incisive challenges.
If Jay and Wilkinson opened the Safeguarding can of worms which remains episcopally led and synodicaly governed, the good folks behind GS2364 are urging Synod to kick that can further down the road once again. With this Response Paper- which Synod will probably pass- we will not discuss it again until February 2025 and probably not conclude matters until 2026 by which time an entirely new Synod will be elected many of whom will lack historic memory.Of course many of those responsible for the abuse debacle will by then be dead or retired. It is the perfect “Sir Humphrey solution” to the embarrassments of the past.
Except it is not “the past”; talking to survivor supporters last week I learnt that new scandals are emerging with the same problems being encountered, and why would that not be the case? The same people who let victims down two years ago are still in post unchallenged and unaccountable, and there are still no conflicts of interest policies in place, or other improved safeguards for due process. Jay identifies that our Safeguarding falls well below the secular world and is inconsistent between Dioceses. That is not being addressed and will not be anytime soon.
Worse; the Archbishops have previously assured us that they deprecate the silencing of victims by the use of Non Disclosure Agreements. I already knew that these have been re-badged as “confidentiality clauses” or “non disparagement clauses” but I have now learnt that the Church has begun sending “cease and desist” letters to troublesome folk allegedly “ harassing” the institution by refusing to be fobbed off. Coming from lawyers charging £500 per hour, the threat of costs orders is plainly intended to intimidate critics into silence. Perhaps we can shame the Church into addressing legitimate grievances rather than bullying the already damaged and vulnerable in this way. Frustrated people became irritated and angry; solve the problem – not the predictable response. Think of your worst experience with a call centre then magnify it by a thousand.
If the Church’s response to its safeguarding crisis have got worse “on the ground”, it has turned equally sour institutionally. After spending £1m on two professional and timely produced Reviews from Dr Wilkinson and Professor Jay and her team, the Church had clear narratives of how incompetently and inconsistently the Church has been led. Nobody knows where “the buck stops”, everybody denies personal effectiveness and responsibility- but all was not lost.
First Dr Wilkinson identified that after it had been arraigned before IICSA and given one last chance to put its house in order, the Church Establishment bulldozed the creation of an “ Independent” Safeguarding Board ignoring pleas from the floor of Synod to build into the process some key performance indicators.
Her report was brilliant, comprehensive, incisive and produced at pace. It stunned the Archbishops Council. It has never been comprehensively examined and debated by Synod. We learned that there was a fundamental failure to establish from the outset what “independent” was supposed to mean.The ISB members came from secular backgrounds where there is a commonly understood culture of independence, yet as former ISB member Steve Reeves, identified, what the Church actually means by ‘independent’ is “semi detached”.
This is no mere aphorism. The Church operates as a chumocracy, with a number of “good chaps” ( usually chaps ) who can be relied upon to “do the right thing” without formal limits in place. Thus it is bad form to expect the inconvenience of “conflicts of interest policies” or clear role definitions. Managerialism has been criticised for permeating the leadership culture but basic good management practice continues to evade us. Define the problem carefully before you try and fix it.
Dr Wilkinson further identified a failure to properly resource the ISB to meet its challenges; under resourced ab initio, it was further debilitated over the prolonged period during the suspension of the Chair who was thus unable to exercise her allocated role to advance the 12 critical Reviews into the acute and chronic needs ofvulnerable survivors.
It is now over a year since the ISB was peremptorily terminated without what Dr Wilkinson identified as ‘trauma awareness’. Those cut adrift were confirmed to have suffered ‘significant harm’ by Prof David Glasgow, a consultant Clinical Psychologist, who had had been recruited (but never deployed) by the Church to advise on such matters. Nobody within the Church has resigned or suffered any consequence for such failure, but worse has ensued.
One of the ‘ISB 12’ chose to walk away from the outstanding Review process but the remaining ‘ISB 11’ continue to agitate for justice. Some have spoken of suicidal ideation – our victims were already people acknowledged as hurt and vulnerable.
Without consultation (a continuing grievance in this and other cases) a reviewer was appointed. Pastoral support continued to be provided to the ISB 11 by Steve Reeves and Jasvinder Sanghera on a voluntary basis because of their conscientious acceptance of ongoing professional responsibility. Ms Sanghera became Dame Jasvinder Sanghera because of such commitment to supporting the abused.
One year later, not one of the urgent reviews has even been commenced let alone concluded.
Let’s do that again…
One year later, not one of the urgent reviews has even been commenced let alone concluded.
The blame lies once again with the project management rather than the individual reviewer who, I am given to understand, is deeply frustrated; there is evidently not even a required data sharing protocol in place; the ISB had similar data management issues 12 months ago; nothing has changed
The costs however continue to mount. Questions will be asked at General Synod as to the costs of the Reviewer and support staff to date. Mr Crompton was engaged on a two day per week consultancy contract, with support from a Business Manager specifically recruited for the task. The costs to date of achieving no progress is unlikely to be much shy of £100k based upon known comparable payments. Added to the £700k costs of the Jay report, the £350k costs of the Wilkinson Report and an unknown portion of the £300k budgeted for the ‘Response Group’ and we have a lot of expenditure for not a lot of tangible outcome to date.
Our victims continue to be sidelined and to suffer.
The Response Group has recently delivered its first report. They have collated and presented views on ‘the way forward’ together with research that confirms that the closer you are to responsibility for the way things have been badly done, the more resistant you are likely to be towards the proposals of Prof Jay. The one thing it is clear about is this: notwithstanding the suffering of the ISB11 and importantly – new survivors coming forward to join the ranks of neglected victims of injustice – the Response Group lacks any sense of urgency.
Worse, it has failed to address the fundamental question which anyone examining the shambles need to ask.
‘Given that a key failure of the ISB arose from a mismatched understanding of the word ‘independence’ between secular world safeguarding experts and the Church Establishment (Archbishops’ Council, Secretariat, House of Bishops, DSA’s etc) why has the Response Group made not the slightest effort to grasp that nettle and articulate what it thinks independence means? Is it yet again a case of ‘Not my job, squire’?
The Response Group employs the terms ‘independent’ and ‘independence’ 175 times in its report. This implies a degree of importance to be attached to it. Unless and until we have a clear benchmark meaning of the term, all discussion is mere ‘blah, blah, blah’.
The Church has dispensed a great deal of time money and cruelty yet its Response Group has failed to even see the wood for the trees.
Professor Jay has delivered a simple and effective model of how to deliver independence in accordance with commonplace secular modelling. Diocesan Safeguarding Advisors/Officers would continue to do the work in situ as at present according to the duties set out in Diocesan Safeguarding Advisors Regulations 2016; a few housekeeping adjustments would need to be undertaken to align those duties with the new structure but the outcome would be minimal on the ground but with one primary vital change.
There would be no confusion as to where the safeguarding buck stopped.
It would be the duty of one charity to deliver independent Safeguarding without conflict of interest and it would be the duty of a second charity to oversee the performance of the first. Both would have independent Trustees with expertise and be required to focus on one issue only – delivering Safeguarding properly.
All DSAs would work to a common standard and be independently regulated; they would equally be resourced externally to a consistent level. If the two charities were not well run by their respective Boards of Trustees, they could be suspended and replaced without complications; now apply that test to Diocesan Bishops.
Whether General Synod members have the time, motivation expertise, and desire to examine the deficiencies of the Response Group, we shall soon discover.
If this is how we put survivor interests first one might have wondered what a low priority looks like, however we do have one useful piece of evidence of what CofE ‘business as usual’ looks like.
The Makin Report into the crimes of John Smyth, first reported to Lambeth Palace in 2013, is now 1500 days late; the copies were due to have been sent out to named persons in the report for the process known as Maxwellisation on the 13th May. They were sent out last week to some organisations, some of whom might be significantly ‘lawyered up’.
How long it will take to assess their representations is anybody’s guess. Prof Jay delivered a clear functional structure for reform with a plea to act urgently and not to tinker; the Church knew better.
The Church always ‘knows better’ and therein lies the root of the Safeguarding shambles we are in.
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The Canon W G Neely case exemplifies what is so wrong in Anglicanism. It perhaps affirms many of the points made so eloquently above by Martin Sewell. The perception of an Anglican Bishop, as being an unaccountable and authoritarian type of medieval lord, helps absolutely no one: not Bishops, not clergy, not interns, not Church members, and certainly not the evangelistic witness of the Church. If we were seeking to drive people away, the cultist or coercive Bishop (or Archbishop) is satan’s Ace card. Should the All-Ireland Primate, Archbishop John McDowell, be facing calls for his resignation, if he fails to make a public statement on the shameful cover up of sadistic child abuse by Canon W G Neely? Why is he not fixing a formal and independent inquiry, led by a barrister or judge, to explore Church of Ireland failure to deal with the issue for decades? ‘A word of truth outweighs the whole world’-and the witness of one brave abuse victim, the late Eddie Gorman, has kicked over the applecart on a massive Church of Ireland cover up by senior clerics. Archbishop John McDowell should clarify if he was present at Mt Merrion parish during the time the late Canon W G Neely ill-treated children.
There doesn’t appear to be any mechanism to change the appropriately termed ‘chumocracy’. Thinking about it, there are precious few consequences for them however inept and obfuscating they are. Why would they change?
I greatly respect those who continue to lobby for something better. Personally I find it too triggering to persist with them. I’d advise anyone else similarly disposed: don’t waste your precious life on them. Take your money and talents elsewhere.
Steve, have you read ‘Letters to a Broken Church’? Chapter 5 considers lessons learn within the Roman Catholic tradition in Ireland, and how holding very senior leaders to account (dismissing them where necessary) brought about a massive culture change. Chapter 5 is only 4 pages long, yet it possibly gives direction on where Anglicanism needs to move. Legal games buy time (v expensively I might add) for victims and/or abusers to die, or simply get forgotten about. Legal quackery may suit senior clerical cliques seeking to cover up abuse. Ian Elliott, in his Chapter 5 section of Letters to a Broken Church, notes how victims need to refuse to be silenced by NDA’s or cash if the culture is to change, and to make sure abusers are held to account, as well as senior leaders who have shielded abusers.
The Canon W G Neely episode in Irish Anglicanism exposes what happens when the rot stretches to the very top. Down and Dromore Diocese have failed to formally name Neely as a child abuser, even after a Dec 2023 legal settlement payout. Archbishop John McDowell, All-Ireland Anglican Primate, has referenced his own time at Mt Merrion parish in earlier life. This might appear to coincide with when Neely was there. Is there an inherent conflict of interest present, for all the world outside of the Church of Ireland hierarchy to plainly see?
Why does Archbishop McDowell not follow plain logic, and immediately fix a judge (or barrister) led inquiry into the sinister cover up of child abuse by Neely? Is the Archbishop terrified of the potential cost if lots more victims emerge? The late Eddie Gorman, the victim who won compensation in Dec 2023, inferred that there may be plenty more Neely victims.
Luke’s Gospel has a message for senior Anglican leaders who cynically cover up abuse: “For all that is secret will eventually be brought into the open, and everything that is concealed will be brought to light and made known to all.”
Yes, an excellent volume, but 5 years on and other great books, still no change in culture. Ironically I suspect with English society being less religious perhaps than The Irish, the impact of the various Reviews and scathing reports/letters/books is diminished. Basically almost no one cares, whereas they did in Ireland.
It took a major ITV drama on the PO scandal to galvanise enough antagonism against Rev Vennels, for her to lose her CBE, but even with the scale of outrage, the subject quickly gets passed over for the latest news, whatever that may be.
The Church understands one thing, and one thing only: Money. My prayers are for a secular government to strip its constituents of charitable status, seize central funds for recompense of clerical abuse survivors and start putting leaders in prison for covering up. By no stretch of the imagination have I ever been a socialist; far from it, but radical external surgery is required.
The loss of members, or many minimising financial commitment, means the cover up of abuse loses the Church money over the longer term.
I agree. However there are two considerable buffers to any short term change: 1 substantial central wealth, which supports the Establishment in their comfy positions; and 2. The central interest/disinterest of ordinary people in the C of E. Typically only using the Church for hatch, match and dispatch services (which it still does well) ordinary mr and Mrs Joe doesn’t much notice these scandals which seem far removed from those family events. By way of example, a couple we know well wanted to get married in church. They did the prerequisite attendance and were ok with it, even to the point of extending and continuing their engagement in church. However, as they became more involved they discovered that some of their own close friends who happened to be gay, would be expected to change their whole lifestyle or worse, if they wanted to attend too. In the end they could no longer be part of something which to them was discriminatory. Now they don’t go. They don’t protest like I do, they just won’t be interested anymore. They are part of a national wave of indifference.
Numbers are falling with each new survey we see. But the buffer of central wealth insulates them from change.
The saddest issue is how clerical hypocrisy and cruelty drives away some of the most committed believers. The hatch-match-dispatch adherents seek ‘a quiet life’. But that blinkered approach has set up an environment where the abuse of power-sex-money needs no sermon: just read headlines about the Anglican Church!
It is sad.
The last census showed a mark decline in people even identifying as Christian. I suspect the message is getting out there that Church can be very unsafe. The headlines offer regular reinforcement not to attend. Pilavachi-gate was front and centre in the Daily Telegraph. Who would allow their children to go to Soul Survivor Watford now?
Watching a fair bit of daytime cricket I’ve noticed a number of regular adverts (aimed at my demographic) for simple I.e. non religious cremations. The “dispatch” element of the status quo is probably being eroded too.
On the day that the Smyth Review, for which the NST are responsible and accountable, is 1500 days overdue, the following entry can still be found on the C of E website:
‘Update on Smyth review
17/01/2024
Statement from National Director of Safeguarding
The following statement has been issued by the independent reviewer into the Church’s handling of allegations against the late John Smyth. We would like to say as commissioners of the review, the NST recognises the process has gone on longer than is acceptable for those waiting for an outcome and for the Church to act and learn on the outcomes of the report. Along with the reviewer we apologise for this delay. We continue to offer additional resources and financial support to ensure the report is received by the end of April with a view to publication as soon as practically possible after that date.’
The National Director of Safeguarding promised that the Smyth report would be published as soon as possible after the end of April.’
Notwithstanding the fact that survivors of historic Church-related abuse no longer believe the Church leadership is even capable of being truthful on the historic abuse cases, the current situation (in which it is not even clear that all copies of the Smyth report have yet been distributed just to commence the ‘maxwellisation’ process) is unacceptable.
Either Alex knew in January that his comments were untrustworthy, and just didn’t care, or he didn’t know, and is grossly incompetent at his job.
Or perhaps both.
To deliberately raise survivors’ hopes in the way he did is unacceptable.
I personally raised serious issues with him in face to face meetings in 2022 & February 2023.
He has done absolutely nothing to address these very serious issues involving 2 current Diocesans in the Southern Province.
Perhaps it is time to consider whether his abilities might be better suited to an alternative role?
Media exposure, especially by TV, may be the far more efficient way to force change.
You never know, we may yet see a TV documentary on the C of E’s abuse scandal.
But I wonder if even that will have the needed effect. Previous documentaries, such as the one on Smyth, don’t seem to have done it. The Church just motors on regardless.
I think now the only solution will be the judgment of God – perhaps, as Steve says, in the form of a secular government forcing drastic improvements on the C of E.
Chapter 5 of ‘Surviving Church’ saw Ian Elliott celebrate a relative success story of positive change in Irish Catholicism. The variable which always changes things is proper punishment, or just the threat of it. The removal of Irish Catholic Bishops, who resisted change or obstructed safeguarding, massively improved matters.
That’s what we now need in Anglicanism. Any Bishop or Archbishop, who neglects victims, should face removal. There are compelling reasons to fix a barrister (or judge) led inquiry into savage and sadistic abuse of people in the Down and Dromore Diocese. Bishop David McClay has not, so far as I am aware, let Church members know how exactly much the total diocesan legal fees for the W G Neely case are (Church and presumably victim fees as well).
A 27 APR 20 Church of Ireland Notes from ‘The Irish Times’ article is called
‘New Primate’. It refers to Archbishop John McDowell and says: ‘…The new Primate is a native of East Belfast where his faith was nurtured in Mount Merrion parish where the rector was the late Canon Billy Neely…’
Is this Canon W G Neely (the child abuser cleric) being celebrated, or is it a different Canon Billy Neely? If the All-Ireland Primate is possibly not neutral, or potentially has a conflict of interest, should he be convening a judge or barrister led inquiry into the scandalous Church cover up of Canon W G Neely’s child abuse?
The need for this might be perfectly plain in any other equivalent large business or public organisation, but not the Church of Ireland it appears. Is Archbishop McDowell at risk of bringing the Anglican Church into disrepute, and does he undermine his own credibility, as a competent and impartial leader, able to exercise a quasi-judicial role as All-Ireland Primate?
It is also self-evident, how there may be very serious (and/or un-investigated) wider problems getting covered up relating to a New Wine training programme in Down and Dromore Diocese. The sinister disappearance of a number of students should have set alarm bells ringing a long time ago.
A senior teacher and Belfast university professor left the Diocese in disgust at savage ill-treatment of students not being addressed. Will it take child abuse, rape, suicide, police involvement or a mixture of all these, before Archbishop McDowell finally acts professionally, and fixes up an independent inquiry into the rancid abuse stench coming from Down and Dromore Diocese?
James, I relate to your saying,”Any Bishop or Archbishop, who neglects victims, should face removal’.
In my support for Kenneth of the ‘Kenneth Saga’ blogs on this forum, in more than four years we have indisputable detailed evidence that Kenneth was unlikely to have to have committed any sexual impropriety.
This evidence has been presented to: both Archbishops, three Bishops, three Canons, a Dean and a Diocesan Safeguarding Adviser. A fourth Bishop promoted a Canon to a safeguarding role whilst she was being investigated under a safeguarding CDM connected to Kenneth’s case.
Recent new evidence shows a risk assessment was fraudulent and deliberately fabricated. This has been sent to the Bishop, a Canon, the Dean and the DSA. We have asked that Kenneth should be totally exonerated from all charges and the deadline for that decision is Monday July 1 2024.
I will post progress on a comment on this blog.
Was the evidence formally presented to the supervising Archbishop?
C of E archbishops don’t actually supervise diocesans. They have little power over them – and the current ones certainly won’t do much. Neither would Sentamu have done.
Thank you for your question James. I made two different complaints at different times to the Archbisop of Canterbury with substantial supporting evidence for each. These had two different results. They were both posted ‘Special Delivery’.
Throughout the four years, from time to time I would compile a document of events with substantial documented evidence proving the fallaciousness of the Safeguarding Core Group’s processes. I sent the first of these with the first complaint and a different, later document with the second complaint.
1. The first complaint to the Archbishop was passed by him to the Provincial Safeguarding Adviser. In a telephone conversation I told him the Diocesan Safeguarding Adviser had said, in an email, their role was not to seek the truth. He told me in no uncertain terms that is not true and I must have misread and misunderstood – this despite my sending him the quotation from a dated email from her. My evidential document he said he had ‘skimmed through’ and as he only dealt with complaints of Bishops and Deans Kenneth must go through a Diocesan complaints system. I said he had but he still said they couldn’t help. He offered to pass on my complaint I had sent to the Archbishop to the Diocesan complaints system. I heard no more.
Some months later I heard there was to be a review of safeguarding procedures at Lambeth Palace. I applied to be part of this review and had an hour’s Teams meeting with two of the Reviewers. We all laughed at my being told I had misunderstood and misread, ‘Our role is not to seek the truth’. (I am really quite litererate as you can see).
This second complaint was sent by the Archbishop to a different Safeguarding Officer at Lambeth who had been engaged after the first one had left. The new one rang me and we had a long sympathetic phone call.She asked to have sight of my various documents, which I sent her.
She explained that she was unable to give practical help but she would pass on any documents I sent her to the Diocesan Safeguarding Adviser asking her to respond to ‘Mrs Hunt’. Several documents were sent but the DSA, as was usual with her, refused to acknowledge or reply.
Where we are now in Kenneth’s story is my response to you above June 28th 6.59 am.
A longer answer than I would have liked to your apparently simple question.
Hi Susan, the Bishop or Archbishop perhaps has an immediate conflict of interest when reports of abuse (spiritual, sexual, bullying, harassment etc…) are received. They are called to exercise pastoral care and shepherding of clergy and Church employees. So can they also hold a quasi-judicial role, in terms of processing victim complaints against staff with absolute fairness? Or have they often passed serious complaints to the police, but if no criminal charges arise been happy to let complaints just be ignored? The arguments for independent safeguarding are surely compelling in the wake of abuse scandal coverups.
With a one or two notable exceptions, they do the minimum possible. Their allegiance is to the Institution. Conflicts of interest are two a penny.
The one joy of politics, such as it is, is a severe day of reckoning every 4 or 5 years. The hope is that the greedy, self-serving, correct, inept, blundering scoundrels may well receive their comeuppance; well at any rate, the sack. And the new lot (we can only dream) may be better. No such reckoning occurs in the Church, at least not this side of eternity.
We can still lobby of course, but our effective audience is a limited number of similarly suffering others who may just get what we’re saying and build up some momentum together.
The buck stops with every other CEO……
Yes, but the Church of England is not a business, and its archbishops are not CEOs in that sense.
Which is not to say that they shouldn’t be assuming much more responsibility for safeguarding failures than they are doing. General Synod also bears a share of the blame, and Archbishops’ Council has a lot to answer for.
Can someone who is confident on these issues not call for a mass walkout from General Synod if Jay is not immediately implemented? It would get the issue onto the news.
An excellent idea Nigel. Last year I wrote to Diocesan Synod members in Kenneth’s Diocese and suggested it but of course it didn’t happen. Now it is more urgent than ever.I am sure it would work if people were brave enough. Just think of the publicity and the result. No alternative but the implementation of Jay
No violence needed; just a calm exit.
I’m not sure that enough General Synod members understand the issues, and feel strongly enough about them, for that. Synod is very carefully managed to prevent their getting enough information. Though they did revolt in numbers a year ago to force the authorities to et the ISB members speak.