THE CLOYNE report may be published next week.
Prepared by the Murphy
commission, it follows an investigation into the handling of clerical
child sex abuse allegations by church and State authorities over a
13-year period in the Catholic diocese of Cloyne.
Yesterday
Minister for Justice Alan Shatter said it was “likely the report can be
brought before Cabinet on Tuesday week and be published very shortly
thereafter.”
Speaking on RTÉ Radio 1’s
This Week programme he indicated the delay in publication of
the report was due to “a long-drawn-out process of consultation
involving lawyers who had an interest in the matter”.
The completed
report was presented to the former minister for justice Dermot Ahern on
December 23rd last.
Its findings concern clerical child sex abuse
allegations made between January 1st, 1996, when the Catholic Church in
Ireland first introduced child protection guidelines, and February 1st,
2009.
It was ordered by the government in January 2009 after publication
the previous month of a report on the Cloyne diocesan website that
found child protection practices there were “inadequate and in some
respects dangerous”.
That report had been prepared by the church’s own child protection watchdog, the National Board for Safeguarding Children.
The
government extended the remit of the Murphy commission to include
Cloyne.
The commission at the time was also investigating the handling
of clerical child sex abuse allegations against a sample 46 priests in
the Dublin archdiocese.
It published that Dublin report in November
2009.
Its Cloyne report contains 26 chapters, is about 400 pages
long, and includes findings on all 19 priests who faced abuse
allegations there over the 13-year period investigated.
On April
8th last, president of the High Court Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns decided
parts of the report should not be published pending the outcome of
criminal proceedings against one priest.