IICSA report - The Abbey statement

Oh dear. The new Abbot Dominic Taylor has made a statement on the Abbey website, and unfortunately it is clear that they are back to their old minimising tricks.

It doesn't start well.

The Abbot of Ealing on behalf of the Monastic Community of Ealing apologies [sic] profusely for the events that have given rise to very serious criticisms outlined in the Inquiry of wrongs by past members of the Community.

Past members of the community? Some of the Inquiry's most trenchant criticism was directed towards Abbot Martin Shipperlee, who to the best of my knowledge (as demonstrated by a page on the Ealing Abbey website devoted to him) is still a member of the Community. I think I would have heard if he had been expelled or laicised. Not that it is likely to happen, at least not because of any of his failings as Abbot.

Any abuse of children is wicked and deeply sinful. We accept the Inquiry's findings that actions were not taken that could have reduced serious risk and harm to the children in our care.

Fine so far as it goes, which is no distance at all.

The children affected are in our daily prayers and we recognise the shame brought upon us. We also accept this.

Prayers are all very well, but has it really not occurred to the Community that some rather more active response could conceivably have been considered?

Since 2012 whilst continuing to support the Benedictine ethos, St Benedict's School is now an entirely separate institution and the Monastic Community exercises no control in either the governance or management of the school.

It is hard to work out precisely what to make of this. First of all, it isn't true. Yes, the Abbey and School are now two separate charitable trusts, each of whom has its own governance structure and provides its own accounts to the Charity Commission. But page 27 of the school's most recent (August 2018) accounts lodged with the Charity Commission lists the governors of the school, among whom are Dom Ambrose McCambridge, Abbot Martin Shipperlee and Dom Dominic Taylor. I presume Abbot Martin Shipperlee has since resigned and been replaced by another monk. Admittedly the monks do not form a majority on the board of governors, but this is still hardly a situation where the Abbot can justifiably claim that the Monastic Community "exercises no control" over the governance of the school.

So this looks like another effort at minimisation - trying to distance the Monastic Community from the disgraceful events at the School. I can see why it is being done, but perhaps more effort might instead have been made to reform the Community do that such distancing isn't actually necessary?

Terrible lessons have been learned about the causes and recognition of abuse and the actions that should have followed whenever any suspicions arose.

We recognise that these events have had appalling consequences on the victims and we have used our very best endeavours to ensure that this can never be repeated.

I really wish I could be confident that this was true. Unfortanately I cannot. The reason is that the safeguarding page of the parish website says "Ealing Abbey follows the NATIONAL SAFEGUARDING POLICIES AND PROCEDURES OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH OF ENGLAND & WALES".

Unfortunately the capitalisation of the title (which is copied directly from the Parish website) does not improve the content. I have reviewed the content. The church's national procedures contain shortcomings I complained about 10 years ago in respect of the school's safeguarding policies. If the Monastic Community were serious about employing its "very best endeavours" to improve safeguarding, they would have noticed this and tried to do something a bit better. I don't know whether they haven;t noticed, or whether they noticed and didn't bother. Neither reflects terribly well on them.

But what strikes me most about this statement is how entirely free of content it is beyond general expressions of regret. There is no action underway or even proposed that would give substance to their "very best endeavours". In that respect it is massively tone-deaf, and quite frankly an insult to generations of pupils who suffered from the attentions of abusers (including monks) at the school.