
In recent days and weeks, those of us who take an interest in safeguarding concerns in the Church of England have noticed a level of confusion and incoherence in this area among the senior levels of church management. The latest misstep on the part of our church leaders is that surrounding the appointment of David Urquhart, the former Bishop of Birmingham to the role of Bishop to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York (BACY). This appointment caused a negative reaction among some survivor groups. Bishop Urquhart has been publicly named in at least two cases of serious failure over safeguarding cases. Here it is not necessary to dwell on these well-rehearsed lapses or failures of judgment on his part. Rather we question the wisdom of allowing any individual who has so evidently attracted serious criticisms to his name to be, once again, prominent on the stage of national church decision making.
On this occasion Lambeth Palace (LP) has responded to criticisms by announcing that the safeguarding part of the post of BACY is to be handed to Ijeoma Ajibade, Chief of Staff at Lambeth Palace. This does not, in fact, sound like a clarification but more like a panic response or reaction to the criticism. No one has indicated that this holder of the post of Chief of Staff has any qualifications or experience in the safeguarding field. In fact of the three key people who oversee the CofE’s efforts in this arena, the head of the NST, the Lead Bishop and now the Archbishops’ Chief of Staff, each may have varying degrees of professional experience and backgrounds relevant to their roles. However, the task of applying these to the complex structure of the CofE and the centres of real power in the Church is extremely challenging for newcomers. Whether any of them have the authority to effect necessary change is something that can by no means taken for granted. Is LP continuing with its delusion that as long as there is someone with the job title of safeguarding, then everything will come out all right? In view of the countless ways that things can go wrong, that is a short-sighted assumption to make.
When the auditors of SCIE were writing their report last year, they were clearly assuming that the bishop replacing Emma Ineson (the former BACY) would have her safeguarding brief as part of their job-description. LP (and its lawyers!) also had access to the report for several months beforehand. No one at the review stage of the report saw fit to correct this perfectly reasonable assumption on the part of SCIE. Questions arise about how this apparent panic response and muddle ever arose. Had senior people at the Palace and Church House simply forgotten about the Urquhart’s safeguarding failures or is this yet another example of senior figures in the CofE failing to grasp the importance of understanding safeguarding from the survivors’ perspective? The SCIE report, as we saw, drew attention to a serious failure of empathy for survivors at LP. Perhaps this is just a further example of such insensitivity in operation. The SCIE report also identified bullying and fear among the junior staff and a reticence for taking unwelcome news ‘upstairs’.
Meanwhile further confusion continues at the Independent Safeguarding Board (ISB). We have to remember that this group received significant blanking from General Synod in February. The controllers of the agenda at Synod did not allow even the existence of the group to be mentioned in the published agenda. This blanking does not allow us to know what the ISB thinks it has achieved in the first year of its existence. The three individuals chosen to make up the ISB all bring significant life-experience to their roles.. But we still do not yet have a sense of what they feel able to do, in supporting and critiquing safeguarding work across the CofE. It is still hard to discern what they expect to achieve and how their work dovetails into all the other safeguarding initiatives being undertaken at present. They also do not seem to know whether the powers that be in the Church will allow them to be effective. Several major stumbling blocks stand in their way. One is, as we have already reported, the stepping back of the Chair, Maggie Atkinson. This took place months ago, and we had expected that some kind of resolution to this problem might have been achieved by now. It is hard to see how the rest of the Board can achieve very much in the light of this major impediment. It is an absurd situation. A second factor standing in the way of being an effective operation is that the two remaining active members are employed part-time. Jasvinda Sangera, the survivors’ advocate, is said to be employed by the Archbishops’ Council for one or two days a week. This may provide sufficient time to write reports, but it will not be sufficient for the task of finding survivors and creating robust lines of communication with them. Nor will it allow them to undertake major investigations or detailed case work. There seems to be an acceptance on the part of the remaining ISB members that their capacity to perform the tasks that the Archbishops’ Council might hand to them is beyond their resources, manpower and financial. Such candour on their part is important and welcome.
The recent SCIE report about LP provoked a vigorous response from Ms Sangera of the ISB and this was published on their website. In it she first calls for ‘a less complicated system so that survivors have clear referral pathways supported by a team.’ Clearly, she has met a number of survivors and this is also reflected in her second demand. She knows all about delay and ignored pleas for this group, since these are constantly encountered. She asks those who receive such pleas for help to provide ‘actions in good time that provide updates and assurances to those they serve in safeguarding’. All this is summed up by a plea from Ms Sangera that the church authorities ‘should prioritise arrangements for identifying and responding to complaints about safeguarding received by the Palace, which this report states is hampered by the lack of a comprehensive complaints system’.
Clearly Ms Sangera has some good ideas for safeguarding and many survivors might feel heartened by the thought that there is an apparently independent voice articulating some of their needs. She also appears to have a good grasp of the way that church structures are frequently ineffective in meeting the real needs of survivors. But the serious problems of delivery remain. One we have already mentioned, the part-time commitment of the ISB members and its depleted strength. The other complaint that I have heard is that, even after a year of operation, the ISB has failed to become widely known. Much communication these days takes place on Twitter and Facebook. The ISB profile on Twitter is virtually non-existent. Any campaigning organisation in 2023 should be working hard to identify followers and activists in the field. Even though the ISB has professional and paid PR support, there seems to be minimal online activity and the website is not easy to find. The website, when you find it, contains very little information of help to survivors. Surely a well-funded organisation like the ISB can devise ways of creating interest in its work and having a strong online presence?
The safeguarding world of the CofE is not, as far as one can see, in good health at present. The bureaucracy at the centre, whether in Church House or LP does not communicate a loving or empathetic face to survivors. The difficulty that these official structures have in showing compassion and care, has an unfortunate result. When individuals, who actually do possess human compassion, work within these structures, they can quickly become disillusioned. These unresponsive structures evidently sap the morale of staff every bit as much as through their dealing with angry and frustrated survivors.
One by one people of empathy seem to be squeezed out of these bureaucratic systems because they are often, quite simply, fairly toxic environments to work in. We have seen the high turnover of staff at the NST, and it is clear from the published material from the ISB, that its individual members have not found it easy to find their way within the total system. The CofE is, like most other organisations, instinctively programmed to put its own its own survival and existence as the highest value. The demands of safeguarding are seen by many to attack the two things that are held to be vital to the CofE’s survival – its assets and reputation. The task of dealing justly and honourably with survivors may assist with the integrity of the Church, but any substantial alignment with honesty and just dealing is seen by some to undermine the wider institution in terms of its material well-being and institutional power.
We have begun to see how some of the serious reputational issues that the Church is currently facing may be a direct consequence of failings in the safeguarding sphere. Getting things right in this area is thoroughly hard work and there are signs of weariness and loss of stamina among many involved clergy and lay-people. They dread hearing the word safeguarding in any church context. Even though many people inside the CofE do not want to hear anything further about protecting the vulnerable, any further failings in this area will weaken and undermine the structure of the whole Church. We need to hear the survivors; we need the reconcilers and healers. In short we need to find again the values of integrity, honesty and justice in our Church. Whenever we lose sight of these things, we are in danger of seeing the Church itself disappear in the course of one or two generations. The writing is on the wall when we suddenly discover that men and women of competence and integrity no longer want to seek leadership roles in what has started to become a discredited institution. It is alarming that none of the Diocesan bishops is prepared to step forward and shoulder the responsibility of Lead Bishop for Safeguarding. They fear, as I tried to explain in the last blog post, being swallowed up by dishonesty and even corruption because they detect that integrity, honesty and justice no longer really matter in the Church of England.