A damning report into the handling of child sex abuse allegations in
the Cloyne diocese has found the hierarchy in Cloyne was resisting its
own church policy 12 years after a framework document on child
protection was adopted in 1996.
In addition, the Vatican was “entirely unhelpful” to any bishop who
wanted to implement procedures for dealing with allegations of child
sexual abuse in the Irish Catholic Church, saying the framework
document on child sexual abuse, agreed by the Irish Bishops Conference
in 1996, was “not an official document.”
This gave individual bishops,
“the freedom to ignore” the guidelines, branded by the Vatican as a
“study document.”
According to the 400-page report, there were 15 cases between 1996
and 2005 that “very clearly” should have been reported by the diocese to
the Gardaí, but only six were reported.
The report by Judge Yvonne Murphy (who also led the investigation
into the Dublin diocese), scrutinises how both Catholic Church and State
authorities handled allegations of abuse against 19 priests in the
County Cork diocese.
It is not an investigation into child sexual abuse
by priests but into the handling of allegations.
The Church comes out very badly, the state less so.
The response of Gardaí was “generally adequate,” said the report.
The report covers the period from 1996 (when the Church had introduced its own child protection framework), until 2008.
It found that the response of the Diocese of Cloyne was “inadequate
and inappropriate,” and that the primary responsibility for the failure
lies with the then bishop of Cloyne, Bishop John Magee.
It
says he "took little or no active interest" in the management of
clerical child sexual abuse cases until 2008, 12 years after the
framework document on child sexual abuse was agreed by the Irish
Bishops' Conference.
Publishing the report, Minister for Justice Alan Shatter appealed to
victims of abuse to “come forward” and said that they would be dealt
with by the Gardaí with “compassion and dignity.”
He said that in spite of the creation of new structures and promise
of change, there were still those who continued to act “in bad faith.”
It is not enough to take the words of “organisations on trust” as the
report found they “did not live up to their word.”
He went on, “The failure of the Church to report cases to the Gardaí
was perhaps the most appalling failure of all as it occurred after so
many shocking revelations of past failures.”
He announced the publication of a new Bill, the Criminal Justice Withholding Information on Crimes Against Children and Vulnerable Adults Bill, which will put child protection on a statutory basis and introduce penalties of up to five years imprisonment for breaches.
“There will be no legal grey area which inhibits prosecutions,” said Minister Shatter.
It is difficult to understand the mindset of those who, as recently
as 2006, 2007 and 2008, despite all that has been said and learnt in the
last two decades, to know that they were repeating the failures of the
past, concealing and oblivious of the extent to which their failures
placed children at risk, said Minister Shatter, who apologised “for any
failings of the state.”
The promised legislation will put the Children First legislation
on a statutory basis, said Minister for Children and Youth Affairs,
Frances Fitzgerald.
“There will be no a la carte approach to Children First,” she said.
The Church’s own child protection body, the National Board for
Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church, is currently conducting an
audit of the implementation of child protection policies in all of the
dioceses.
In response to calls from the public to publish the results
of this audit, Ms Fitzgerald said, “the more transparency there is from
the Church, the more reassured one can be.”
The serious failures in Cloyne were first investigated by the NBSCCc and its report was published in December 2008.
Cardinal Seán Brady, Primate of all Ireland has welcomed the report.