REACTION:THE STATE should stop dragging its feet and put in place measures taking responsibility for the safety of children, victims' group One in Four has said.
Speaking following the publication of the report, One in Four director Maeve Lewis urged the Government to enshrine the rights of the child in the Constitution and to ensure child protection services were resourced and consistent nationwide.
“The State must stop procrastinating and immediately put in place measures so that it can take proper responsibility for the safety of Irish children,” she said.
Ms Lewis said investigations had now shown failures in the Ferns, Dublin and Cloyne dioceses. She said there was no reason to believe that the other 23 dioceses would be any different.
However, she said the Cloyne investigation was differentfrom those completed before it as it documented abuse right up to the present day and still highlighted the Catholic Church was not in compliance with its own or the State’s child safety guidelines.
“We live in a different country when the Government Ministers launching this report have stated quite unequivocally that they can no longer trust the word of Catholic bishops on whether they are in compliance with measures.”
Ms Lewis said she was concerned that abuse victims not in contact with support groups like One in Four were not informed of the report’s publication.
She said she had met one Cloyne victim who had not been given a chance to read or prepare for the document’s release.
Abuse victim and campaigner Andrew Madden said the report had proven again that the Catholic Church could not be trusted with the safety and protection of children. He said it was clear the diocese of Cloyne was never “genuinely committed” to the guidelines agreed in the 1996 Irish Bishops Conference framework document.
Mr Madden said he had long been concerned about a qualification in the document for stating that cases should be reported where it was “known or suspected” a religious had “actually” abused a child.
He said it was unacceptable that the National Board for Safeguarding Children, the Catholic Church’s child safety watchdog, could not move child protection concerns into the public domain without the consent of bishops.
“Imagine Hiqa being similarly constrained by the HSE,” he said.
Mr Madden said the papal nuncio should be removed from the position as head of the diplomatic corp here to demonstrate his failure to co-operate with the commission was not appropriate.
“We need to send a strong message about our anger that bishops led people to believe that they were implementing the 1996 guidelines while all the time they and the Vatican were aware of the fact that the Vatican had effectively told them not to do so.”
Ms Lewis acknowledged that resources were scarce given the State’s economic problems but said victims of abuse must be offered the necessary support.
She said the National Counselling Service had a waiting list of more than 1,000 and there was an eight-month wait for the therapy services One in Four offered.
