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The Catholic Church in Scotland has come in for further criticism of its child protection procedures, with a former consultant revealing that the Church has been unable to produce the annual audits of abuse claims that it promised in 1996.
The former child protection consultant, Alan Draper, who worked for the Motherwell diocese for seven years, said the Church in Scotland could not give any details of a coherent national policy, and that individual bishops were allowed to make decisions piecemeal.
“For too long the bishops have been kings in their castles and accountable to nobody,” Draper told the Observer newspaper. “It’s very corrosive. Some dioceses may be doing a good job — but we have no knowledge or information about what’s been going on.”
Draper said he left his position with Motherwell diocese in 2003 because his advice was consistently ignored. He said he had to take Bishop Joseph Devine “kicking and screaming” with him when he tried to implement good practice.
The newspaper said Bishop Devine’s handling of abuse cases continued to be controversial. It cited a letter his solicitors sent a letter to a victim of abuse, confirming that her counselling would be stopped despite warnings from her psychotherapist that she had been suicidal “for substantial periods” during treatment.
The letter said there was “no formal protocol or procedure” for an appeal against the bishop’s decision. Any appeal would be at the bishop’s discretion and would only consider new evidence.
The woman, Ann Matthews, was abused from the ages of 11 to 18 by her parish priest, who admitted the offences. “They are being told someone’s life is in danger and all they can say is too bad,” said Matthews, who had attempted suicide on four occasions. “I am just a drain on their resources.”
The Observer said the secretary of the bishops’ conference, Monsignor Hugh Bradley, admitted he “doesn’t know” if annual audits exist. “They haven’t been done until now,” Monsignor Bradley said, adding: “Some have been done — but I don’t know if they have been done every year.”
Sources:
Image: Scottish Catholic Observer
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