Safeguarding with Confidence - Cumberlege Report

1.1 Lord Nolan’s review ‘A Programme for Action’ set out a blue print for child protection in the Catholic Church in England and Wales. By laying the foundations for sweeping new procedures and structures its 83 recommendations were designed to make the Church ‘an example of best practice in the prevention of child abuse, in responding to it and to rebuild confidence’.2

1.2 Although not integral to the report, it also recommended the Church consider the need for policies and arrangements to cover vulnerable adults and noted that many of the systems it proposed may be capable of extension to vulnerable adults.

1.3 In its executive summary Lord Nolan concluded: “Our hope is that this report will help bring about a culture of vigilance where every single adult member of the Church consciously and pro-actively takes responsibility for creating a safe environment for children and young people. Our recommendations are not a substitute for this but we hope they will be an impetus towards such an achievement.”3

1.4 Five years on, and in accordance with the last of Lord Nolan’s recommendations, the Church undertook to carry out a review of its progress in implementing ‘A Programme for Action’. It is to the Church’s credit that such a review was to be ‘thorough, painstaking and independent’.4 This report is the result of that review. Cumberlege Commission

1.5 The Cumberlege Commission, under the chairmanship of Baroness Cumberlege was established at the invitation of Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor on 11 July 2006. Baroness Butler-Sloss, a former President of the Family Division, was appointed its vice-chair. Seven lay members of the Commission were selected jointly by the Cardinal and chair of the Commission for their expertise and professional standing in the areas of child protection and vulnerable adults. Together they cover the relevant statutory and voluntary sectors though they were not selected as representatives of any one organisation. The remaining five Catholic Church members, who ensured that the Commission’s work was properly grounded in the theology, strategy and everyday experience of the Church, were selected on the recommendation of the Cardinal in consultation with the Conference of Bishops and Conference of Religious. The Commission is particularly grateful to Ms Caroline Abrahams, who served on Lord Nolan’s original review and was therefore able to bring some continuity to its work. A full list of Commission members and secretariat appears at Annex A.

Terms of Reference

1.6 Our terms of reference were agreed as follows:

(i) To review the implementation of the Nolan Report ‘A Programme for Action’ both nationally and locally in the dioceses and religious congregations;

(ii) To make any recommendations for change taking account of statutory and good practice developments since the publication of the Nolan review;

(iii) To consider the role of the central office (COPCA) in delivering these and any outstanding Nolan recommendations.5

1.7 It was never our intention, as the terms of reference make clear, to re-write ‘A Programme for Action’ nor to re-assess each of its 83 recommendations. Nor was it our role to investigate or adjudicate on individual cases and we have not done so. Our task was to comment on the process of implementing Nolan and on the progress made in achieving a safeguarding culture of vigilance, to identify any serious gaps or omissions and to fine tune, where necessary, the safeguarding policies and organisational structures in the light of experience on the ground and developing good practice elsewhere.

How we worked
1.8 We sought contributions to our work from all those who wished to make them. To facilitate this we established a Cumberlege Commission website (www.cumberlegecommission.org. uk) giving details of who we are and what we had been asked to do. We posted a series of open questions on the website specifically designed to address our terms of reference (see Annex B) and asked individuals to comment, in confidence, based on their experiences within, or working with, the wider Catholic Church community.

1.9 Asking these same questions, we formally invited every Bishop, Congregational Leader affiliated to the Conference of Religious and the Chairs of Diocesan Child Protection Commissions, as well as four Government Departments and 36 organisations and representative bodies to submit written evidence. The Rectors of the seven seminaries were invited to comment on whether, and how, the safeguarding of children and vulnerable adults was covered within the curriculum offered by their seminaries. (A full list of those formally invited to give evidence appears at Annex C.) Finally, each diocese was written to encouraging them to place a notice of the Commission’s remit, website and postal address in their Ad Clerum and parish newsletters. The deadline for receiving written submissions was extended to 15th December 2006.

1.10 Altogether we received 290 written submissions from individuals and representative bodies.

1.11 The Commission began the second stage of its review in October 2006. We met with, and took oral evidence from, leading organisations and individuals at every level, parish, diocese, religious congregation, nationally and internationally whose job it is to keep children, young people and vulnerable adults safe from harm (see Annex D). We wanted to learn from their experiences of working with the policies and structures flowing from the Nolan review over the past five years. We also heard from, or for the most part, visited each of the 22 Diocesan and four Regional Religious Child Protection Commissions around the country.

1.12 It was not possible, in the time available to us, to talk to children and young people and vulnerable adults as we would have wished. We recognise, however, the importance of doing so, and doing it with skill, so that those directly affected by the new arrangements can influence their development and delivery in the future in ways that best meet their needs to be kept safe from harm. We make a recommendation to this effect later.

1.13 Our approach throughout has been to be as open, transparent and inclusive in so far as we are able, whilst dealing with the difficult, sensitive and sometimes painful material placed before us. We agreed at the outset to list the organisations we invited formally to give evidence on our website. With this report we are also making available the written evidence they submitted unless the authors have expressly requested that we should not do so.

1.14 It is important to stress, however, that this is a voluntary, not a statutory review. Our decision to hold the oral evidence sessions in private specifically recognises the right of those who came to give evidence to have their right to privacy respected. We also wanted to do all we could to encourage people to come forward and share their experiences with us freely and openly.

1.15 We can only express our deeply felt gratitude to all those who did just that. Their comments, observations and many helpful suggestions have been invaluable. We very much hope our report does justice to what they had to say. Most of all, though we offer our sincere thanks for the work so many have done, and continue to do, to safeguard the young people and vulnerable adults in our Church communities.

1.16 Altogether the Commission met on 15 separate occasions between July 2006 and June 2007, coming together for a two day away session at Downside Abbey to consider our recommendations and draft this report. The report and recommendations reflect the unanimous views of the Commission. Together they provide a coherent rationale and a road map for the changes we believe are necessary to continue the work of making the Catholic Church a beacon of excellent safeguarding practice and one that positively and actively promotes Christ’s Ministry for children, young people and vulnerable adults.

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