Father Gregory Chillman

Time for a recap. Paragraphs 57 and 58 of the Carlile report stated the following.

57. There remained continuing concerns about what should happen to monks who had been convicted, banned (named in List 99) so that they should not work with children, or otherwise should not have any access to children in the school. This was a concern of mine from the earliest stages of my Inquiry. I have discussed the issue with the Abbot, who was alert to the inevitability of a change from previous practice. I recognise that the sense of responsibility felt by the Community for its Brothers, even those who have strayed and sinned heinously, is considerable.

58. I am pleased to say that the Abbot has accepted that another dwelling has to be found for any member of the monastic community falling within the categories described, and that none is at the Abbey now. This must continue as a permanent policy.

Simple enough. Monks on restricted ministry because of behaviour towards children can't stay at the Abbey.

It isn't just Carlile who made this point. it was previously made by the ISI in its April 2010 supplementary inspection report, and Carlile reported that the issue had attracted high-level interest in the DfE. This is paragraph 68 of the Carlile report.

68. The Department for Education, to Ministerial level, has been following carefully the progress of the ISI inspections. I have reviewed the correspondence. The Minister of State for Schools in July 2010 sought reassurance that all the recommendations the ISI had made would be implemented promptly. This has been done. The Minister was particularly concerned about the arrangements whereby monks, after conviction or being placed on List 99, had continued to live at the Abbey, even under restrictions imposed by the Abbey in consultation with the Archdiocese of Westminster. These arrangements were described as ‘ineffective’ (and the practice no longer continues).

One of the monks mentioned by Carlile as having substantiated allegations against him is Father Gregory Chillman. It indicates that the outcome of an allegation against him was "Deemed inappropriate behaviour, restrictions imposed." At the press conference for publication of the report, the BBC caused a great deal of confusion when they asked where Father Gregory Chillman was now living. It was subsequently clarified that he was away from the Abbey at the time.

Well, he wasn't away for all that long, just long enough for the dust to settle. He has continued to be listed on the abbey website among the monks resident at Ealing Abbey. I thought that might be an error, so I wrote to Peter Turner (the diocesan safeguarding adviser) and he replied as follows.

Fr Gregory Chillman is still residing in the Monastery under restrictions and is not allowed to partake in any public ministry.

So, despite the inspection report of the ISI, despite the recommendation of Lord Carlile, despite the assurances made to the Minister of State for Schools, despite the Abbot being "alert to the inevitability of a change from previous practice", despite Lord Carlile's belief stated in the report itself that "the practice no longer continues", Chillman remains at the abbey under restriction.

What on earth is going on there?

Sins of the Fathers

The Times has an editorial today about Ealing Abbey (behind paywall) concerning the Carlile Report. It is worth quoting and commenting on a few bits of it.

It should be read, especially, by those few who may still believe that Catholic bodies have been unfairly tarnished these past few years. For it was commissioned, and published, by Ealing Abbey itself. And its findings are entirely shocking.

I think it worth noting that a number of people have suggested that this blog is merely a self-serving grab for publicity, that it is motivated by virulent anti-catholicism or violent secularism, and that I have been blowing things out of proportion. Well, think again.

This report is not only an acknowledgement of a catalogue of terrible abuse — which began in the 1940s and continued up until 2007 — but also of the long-running failure to address this abuse, or even to acknowledge it as being of suitable severity to be addressed. It was only commissioned long after The Times had begun reporting on a series of allegations of sexual abuse at St Benedict’s, prompting more victims to come forward.

It is inevitable that there will be even more victims who come forward, simply because even if we could wave a magic wand and absolutely guarantee no abuse happens at St Benedict's ever again (something I acknowledge to be impossible), because it can take decades for a victim to acquire the will and courage to come forward, there is going to be a trickle of cases which will probably last for the next 30 years or so.

Lord Carlile recognises primary and secondary fault, with the first belonging obviously to the abusers themselves, and the second being shared between the school and “the monastic community, in its lengthy and culpable failure to deal with what at times must have been evident behaviour placing children at risk”.

All perfectly correct. But I happen to be of the opinion that the secondary fault isn't all that secondary. Paedophiles will be paedophiles, and occupations which involve the care of children will inevitably be attractive to paedophiles. The Catholic priesthood is one such occupation. You can't recognise a potential child sex abuser at sight. As Catherine Pepinster has found out in the case of Father David Pearce, you can know an active abuser very well and still not realise. So, it is inevitable that abusers will get into the priesthood from time to time. The same applies to the teaching profession.

What matters is minimising the number of victims, and minimising the harm done to them. The only way that you can find out that somebody is an abuser is from actual reports of abuse. So these reports, from victims and witnesses are the primary weapon in the fight against abuse. They have to be taken seriously, they have to be passed to the authorities who have the knowledge and training to investigate them properly, and they have to be acted on in so that when abuse is discovered, the abuser is immediately and permanently removed from a position supervising children.

All this Ealing Abbey failed to do. Victims were accused of maliciously accusing their abusers, abusers were permitted to remain, when the complaints got too loud abusing priests were moved to different duties and abusing lay teachers were quietly sacked and sent on their way with a good reference so they they could continue to abuse elsewhere.

All these actions, carried out for the most part by people who weren't abusers themselves, could hardly have been better at maximising the number of victims and the extent of the harm done to them had they been designed with that especial objective in mind. And these action contributed hugely to the overall duration of the abuse and the number of victims, which just at St. Benedict's School must by now number in the hundreds.

Even when Lord Carlile began his report, he writes, another monk banned from working with children was still living there. “The Abbot has accepted that another dwelling has to be found for any member of the monastic community falling within the categories described,” he writes. “This must continue as a permanent policy.”

It stretches credulity that such a thing could even need saying. The fact that it does is indicative of the problems which Lord Carlile highlights, and sheds light upon the Church’s continuing inability to police itself.

In fact, when Lord Carlile began his work, there were two monks living at the Abbey under restrictions, Father Stanislaus Hobbs and Father Gregory Chillman. At the insistence of the Department for Education and over the energetic objections of the Abbot, Father Stanislaus Hobbs was moved to a care home outside the diocese earlier this year. But the Carlile Report lists Chillman as still living at the Abbey under restriction, and the Abbey website also lists him as a monk resident at the Abbey. I believe he has only very recently moved out.

It is this kind of obstructive, grudging response to obviously sensible suggestions for child protection which leave me of the opinion that the abbey and the school cannot move on under their present management.

Back in the beginning

The Daily Mail article has prompted me to take a look back at the first article about Ealing Abbey that I wrote here, way back in August 2009, Catholic clerical abuse at Ealing Abbey and St. Benedict's School.

I think it is worth re-emphasising the main points I made in that original article.

• I made it clear that I did not blame the ordinary Catholics who attend Mass at the Abbey, I acknowledged that they had no idea what was going on.
• I suggested that the Abbey's records on all matters of complaints or allegations of sexual abuse connected to the Abbey should be independently reviewed.
• I suggested that provisions should be made for counselling and pastoral care to be provided to victims, including those who had not yet come forward.
• I suggested that a full and unreserved public apology be issued.
• I suggested that the parish and the schools review their child protection policies.
• And finally, I hoped that those involved in putting things right avoid getting into a siege mentality.

In my naivity back then, it seemed to me that this was a very reasonable and moderate set of suggestions, which no reasonable person, Catholic or otherwise, would have any difficulty with, given the awful truth that had recently come to light about Father David Pearce.

I wasn't asking for the school to be demolished or for the monastery to be dissolved. I wasn't branding all catholics as child abusers or suggesting that the pope was the Antichrist. All I was asking was that the mistakes of the past be acknowledged, the victims be apologised to, and measures be taken to make sure that this can never happen again.

It is now 2 years and 2 months since that original article. Had there been a determination on the part of the Abbot to do so, almost all these things could have been achieved 2 years ago. Each passing month lessened my respect for Abbot Martin and increased my conviction that he was deliberately hiding matters that had not yet come to light, and hoping that it would all blow over.

In December 2009, the Charity Commission published the report of its two Statutory Inquiries into Ealing Abbey. I had no hand in them being set up, they started before I ever became aware of the issue. Publication of the reports had been delayed until after the trial of Pearce had been concluded. The local MP Andy Slaughter said that he had never seen such a damning and critical report from the Charity Commission

In February, what purported to be the report of an "Independent Review" commissioned by the Abbot was published. I later learned who had conducted the inquiry, and a friend of mine spoke to him concerning the circumstances under which it had been carried out. It turned out that:

• the terms of reference were the Abbey only, not the school, 
• it was a paper-only review, nobody was interviewed.
• the reviewer visited for only half a day
• the review addressed only the period covering the abuse of Pearce's last victim, when Pearce was already under restrictions
• the reviewer was not told about the duration and number of Pearce's other known crimes, though he inferred that other crimes not disclosed had been committed.

Despite this, the report was placed on the school website as being the fulfilment of the Abbot's promise of an independent review.

As my concerns increased, and as more facts came to light, I wrote to the Independent Schools Inspectorate and the Department for Education expressing my concerns. The DfE's response was to order the ISI to make an additional unannounced inspection, which resulted in a critical report the like of which had never previously been published by the ISI. This inspection took place at the end of April 2010, six months after my original blog article.

That report was published in July 2010, but not sent to parents until September. In the meantime of course, the cheques for another term's school fees had been sent to the school and banked. By this time, publicity was growing, there had been articles in the Times and there was a degree of restiveness among parents. So a Parental Forum was held, at which two mutually contradictory lines were pursued by the Abbot and headmaster. The first was that the abuse was all in the past, nobody involved with the abuse had any current connection with the school, all was now well and parents had no reason to be concerned. The second line was that this was all so serious that the school had decided to commission Lord Carlile to conduct an independent review.. (The earlier review was conveniently forgotten.)

The first approach was holed below the waterline when a perceptive parent asked if there had been any recent allegations of abuse against monks or members of staff apart from those mentioned in the ISI report. There was dead silence in the room for several seconds, before the headmaster admitted that a current member of staff was at present suspended following allegations of misconduct. (That member of staff was subsequently returned to duties, and the headmaster wrote to all parents on his return. The letter didn't state whether the allegations had been substantiated, but did say that the staff member concerned had been given training in "communication skills". The staff member has since been given additional pastoral duties.)

In June last year, I learned of the connection between Father Gregory Chillman and St. Augustine's Priory School. I also learned of allegations of misconduct by Father Gregory in his role as Chaplain there. There had already been allegations made publicly in the comments of the blog dating from his days as a teacher at St. Benedict's. I took a look at the school's child protection policy on the school website, and saw that it was so bad it made the St Benedict's policy look like a model of thoroughness and diligence in comparison. So I wrote again to the ISI and DfE, passing on the allegations I had received and requesting that they look into it. As it happened, St Augustine's had recently joined the Independent Schools Council, and had just had an ISI inspection in March, and the report had not yet been issued.

The ISI's final report was as critical of St Augustine's as the report of the special inspection had been of St. Benedict's. But rather than accept the report and make the necessary improvements, Mrs Gumley Mason sought Judicial Review of the report in the High Court. Judicial Review is a hard thing to obtain. In order to get an administrative decision by a public body overturned on Judicial Review, you have to demonstrate that the original decision is so perverse that no honest and reasonable person with two braincells to rub together could possibly have reached the original decision. Nearly a year after the original inspection, the report was finally published, still containing all the criticisms the school had complained about.

In June this year, I wrote to the new Papal Nuncio. I summarised my concerns regarding the abbey and both schools, providing brief histories of the key people involved. When I met the Nuncio at the end of July, he told me that he had been so concerned about the letter that he had researched the matter, and as a result had contacted Rome. Cardinal Levada, head of the CDF, had ordered an Apostolic Visitation, which would start in September and be conducted by Bishop John Arnold (auxiliary bishop of the diocese of Westminster) and Abbot Richard Yeo (Abbot President of the English Benedictine Congregation).

So this isn't just a matter of some sad obsessed individual with a grudge against the school (which is how the Abbey has portrayed me to journalists recently). My concerns were well-founded, the authorities agreed with me and have conducted investigations, the results of which so far have borne out my concerns.

In his prizegiving day address in September 2010, Mr Cleugh used the occasion to express his belief that the recent publicity seemed "hell-bent on trying to discredit the School and, at the same time, destroy the excellent relationship between School and Monastery",and speculated that it was "part of an anti-Catholic movement linked to the papal visit". This is not the attitude of a man who thinks that there is any need for improvements.

If I were as anti-Catholic as Mr. Cleugh appears to suggest, I would be taking no trouble at all over the safety of Catholic children. It is after all mainly the children of Catholics who attend Catholic schools. If I were anti-Catholic, I would say that it served them right and leave them to stew in their own juice. But in fact, I believe that the children of Catholics have as much right to be safe in their schools as any other children.

The next chapter will open next week, with the release of the Carlile Report. I very much hope that this will finally set the abbey and St Benedict's School on a new path where the evils of the past are acknowledged and apologised for, and work is finally started in earnest to ensure that this cannot happen again. I do not wish to see the closure of the school. For as long as there are parents who wish for a private Catholic education for their children, the existence of independent Catholic schools is entirely valid. All I expect is that those schools provide the highest standards of safeguarding for the children in their care.

Chillman and St Augustine's

This email has been sent to all parents of St Augustine's

Dear Parents,

Yesterday an article appeared in the Times (p.27) about Fr Gregory who was our chaplain for many years until he formally retired on October 3rd 2010. He had retired as Chair of Governors in June 2009. Fr Gregory was made aware in April 2010 of an historical accusation against him made by a past pupil of St Benedict’s School. He immediately informed this School and from that time on ceased to undertake any teaching activity at the School or to celebrate the regular weekly Mass. From that date on I had contact with the Independent Schools Inspectorate (ISI), Ealing Social Services, the Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO), the Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA) and the Charity Commission regarding both this allegation and an historical allegation from St Augustine’s concerning inappropriate comments made by regarding Fr Gregory in 2004. Although we were advised by the authorities that he could have supervised contact and access to the School

I, together with the Board of Governors, decided for the sake of clarity to bar Fr Gregory from the premises while school was in session. He did participate in the School Carol Service and the Feast Day Mass both public events held at Ealing Abbey. The School has co-operated fully with all relevant authorities regarding these events and will continue to do so as required.

Please note the Central Register of Appointments (CRA), which includes all pre-employment checks and CRBs is regularly updated, is audited every term and was recently comprehensively and positively reviewed by the ISI at their follow up inspection.

Yours sincerely

Mrs F J Gumley-Mason MA (Cantab) Headmistress

This communication is more remarkable for what it doesn't say than for what it does. It was in March 2010 that Chillman resigned as a trustee of St Benedict's and was placed on restricted ministry because of allegations.

I would be very interested to see the minutes of the meeting of the Governors from that time at which it was decided that Chillman should be permitted to continue formally to act as chaplain and governor, and what for what reason they decided against a clean break by simply asking for his immediate resignation, as appears to have occurred with his role as a Trustee of St Benedict's. That hasn't been stated. I'm also curious about how it can be an assistance to clarity that the reasons for the measures taken weren't communicated to the parents at the time.

I also think parents have a right to know more about this incident in St Augustine's in 2004. Did Mrs Gumley Mason know about it at the time? If so, what was done about it at the time? When was a report made to the LADO? What was the advice of the LADO? The relevant correspondence should at a minimum be provided immediately to the governors so that they can discuss it and decide what course of action should be followed.

As for the contact with the Charity Commission and everybody else mentioned, I can and will check that out. The Freedom of Information Act is a wonderful thing. The Charity Commission and Ealing Social Services are both government bodies covered by the Act, and although the ISI is a private organisation, all its papers on St Augustine's have been passed to the DfE since the DfE was added to the court case where the school sought Judicial Review of the ISI's report. The DfE most undoubtedly is covered by the FOI Act. So if it turns out that there has been a little bit of terminal inexactitude in that aspect of Mrs Gumley Mason's email, we will find out in due course.

This bit of Mrs Gumley Mason's email is fascinating: "From that date on I had contact with the Independent Schools Inspectorate (ISI), Ealing Social Services, the Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO), the Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA) and the Charity Commission ...". Note that she "had contact with" them. She's not saying that she "made contact with" them. It leaves entirely unstated who initiated the contact. Did Mrs Gumley Mason contact the authorities to report the issue and ask for advice, or did they contact her to ask what on earth was going on? If Mrs Gumley Mason had initiated the contact, I'm sure she would have wanted to say so very clearly.

Again, it seems to me that the relevant correspondence should be provided immediately to the Governors, so that the truth of the matter can be established.

I already have reason to think that Mrs. Gumley Mason's account may be mistaken on certain points. Here is the relevant part of a letter sent by the ISI to Mrs Gumley Mason on 6th December last year, part of the letter describing the outcome of the school's complaint against the ISI.

We would point out that, during the period between the end of the inspection visit and the issuing of the report on 29th September, concerns relating to the role of this individual and the school and the correct reporting of these were raised with ISI by more than one individual. It was necessary for ISI to consider these alongside the issues which arose during the inspection, as agreed with DfE. ISI liaised with Ealing Social Care on these matters, and attended a strategy meeting.

We agree that during the period of time in question, it was not necessary to refer Father GC to the Independent Safeguarding Authority. As Father GC has now resigned rather than resume his posts as Chaplain and Governor, the school should consider whether a referral is now required in line with its own safeguarding policy and the ISA's published guidance.

That indicates that, according to the ISI, it wasn't the school who raised the issue of Chillman with the ISI, but instead it was "more than one individual". I was one of those individuals. It also indicates that the school did not make any reference to the Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA) at the time.

I'll probably find out anyway via the FOI requests I intend to make.
And when I do, I'll publish it here.

Father Gregory Chillman

The Times has an article (behind paywall) about Father Gregory Chillman. Banned monk investigated over school services.

The essence of the article is that Father Gregory Chillman was put on restricted ministry and barred from access to children in the spring of last year. Despite this, he remained as Chairman of governors of St Augustine's School for a further six months.

Abbot Martin Shipperlee is saying that the allegation which led to Chillman being barred was withdrawn, and so the restrictions were lifted in July. (This is how Shipperlee was able to tell the Parental Forum in September last year that "almost all" the restrictions had been lifted, and so there was no need for Chillman to be removed from the Abbey.)  According to Shipperlee, Chillman apparently agreed to avoid unsupervised contact with children and to visit St Augustine’s only to conduct mass.

There are a number of things about this that are deeply fishy.

The first is that I know for a fact that the diocesan safeguarding authorities knew nothing of the lifting of restrictions on Chillman. I have quite a recent email from Peter Turner, the diocesan safeguarding adviser, which quite unequivocally states that the restrictions on Chillman remain in force on the same terms as they were first applied. I suspect this is why the diocesan spokesman was so keen to distance the diocese from the Abbey in last week's article about Abbot Laurence Soper being on the run from the police. The diocesan spokesman said "Abbot Soper, a member of a Religious Order, is not a priest of the Diocese of Westminster. On safeguarding issues his Religious Order retains primacy in dealing with the police". The diocese is doing a serious Pontius Pilate job on the Abbey. 

The second is that if the allegations against Chillman were sufficient to justify his resignation in March 2010 as a St Benedict's trustee and for him to be placed on restricted ministry, they were surely sufficient to justify requiring his resignation at the same time as chaplain and chairman of governors of St. Augustine's. Do the girls of St. Augustine's matter less than the boys and girls of St. Benedict's? After all, if he's a danger to children, then he is the greatest danger to the children with whom he has an active pastoral role. That is at St. Augustine's.

The third point is that there seems to be a discrepancy between the stated and actual reasons for Chillman's final retirement from St Augustine's in September 2010. Either he retired for reasons of ill-health (the reason given by Shipperlee to Peter Turner and passed to me), or he resigned because of further allegations concerning his conduct at St. Augustine's, which apparently is the reason Shipperlee has now given The Times for the resignation and re-imposition of restrictions.

The fourth point is that the withdrawal of an allegation (which essentially means that the alleged victim no longer wishes to press criminal charges) is no justification for considering the allegation no longer to be a piece of evidence to be taken into consideration when assessing whether a person forms a risk to children.

The ISI Supplementary Report into St. Benedict's doesn't name Chillman (it doesn't name anybody), but I have had it confirmed by Peter Turner that the following passage refers to Chillman.

A monk who had taught in the school a long time ago has recently come under investigation by social services. At the time of the follow-up visits he was living in the monastery under a restrictive covenant barring him from contact with children.

Note "barring him from contact with children". Not "barring him from unsupervised contact with children" which seems to be how Shipperlee has interpreted it.

This all reminds me very much of Shipperlee's modus operandi with respect to the restrictions placed on Father David Pearce. Few people knew that he had been placed under restrictions at all, and those who did know were told that it was "to protect Father David from unfounded allegations", when in fact the allegations were all too well-founded, and had resulted in a civil court judgement against the Abbey and for a victim of abuse to the tune of £43,000.

And we see the same techniques in use again. Chillman resigned as a Trustee of St. Benedict's in March 2010, but no reason for the resignation has been given in the Trustees' report to the Charity Commission. He wasn't required to resign as Chaplain or chairman of governors of St Augustine's - that would have been too noticeable. As soon as the ISI were safely off the premises, the restrictions were lifted and the parents told there was no need for Chillman to live away from the Abbey.

And even after Chillman's resignation as chaplain and chairman of governors of St. Augustine's in September 2010, he still officiated at the school's Christmas Carol service in December 2010 and the school's Centenary Celebration Mass in February 2011. I know he was there, I have copies of the order of service for both occasions. Both of them mention his name, and witnesses have told me he was there. He read the 9th lesson at the carol service, and he gave the homily at the mass. This is after the restrictions were supposedly re-imposed by Shipperlee in September last year following allegations of misconduct in St. Augustine's School itself.

Those services both took place in Ealing Abbey, clearly with the knowledge and consent of Shipperlee. The terms of the restricted ministry, according to the information from Peter Turner were "no public ministry". Saying Mass in Ealing Abbey in front of several hundred parents and pupils of St. Augustine's is most definitely public ministry.

The ISI Supplementary Report into St. Benedict's contains the following recommendation.

Ensure that any staff or members of the religious community live away from the school, if they are subject to allegations of misconduct related to safeguarding or convicted of wrongdoing.

The reason for insisting on this was as follows:

the use of restrictive conditions is not altogether convincing, since the restrictions were not adequate in the case of Fr DP and the failure to implement them occasioned serious criticism in the Charity Commission report of 15 December 2009.

To put it bluntly, the ISI noticed that restricted ministry while a monk remained at the Abbey wasn't in fact an effective safeguard.


It is now high time that the Abbot implemented the ISI's recommendation. He should remove Father Gregory Chillman from the Abbey, and place him in a location which is not associated with an educational institution. This has already been done with Father Stanislaus Hobbs, who now lives in a care home outside the diocese.

Ealing Abbey Trustees' Report

The Accounts and trustees' Report for the year to 31 August 2010 is now available on the Charity Commission website.

I have no doubt that the financial figures are all justified, having been through the auditors and all. But other aspects of the report are thoroughly dishonest, although the lies are mainly lies of omission.

Lets start with the list of Trustees on page 1.

Rt Revd Martin Shipperlee OSB – Chairman
Rt Revd Francis Rossiter OSB (resigned 30 April 2011)
Revd Alexander Bevan OSB
Revd Gregory Chillman OSB (resigned 29 March 2010)
Br Matthew Freeman OSB (appointed 30 April 2011)
Revd Timothy Gorham OSB (appointed 29 March 2010)
Revd Thomas Stapleford OSB
Revd Dominic Taylor OSB

Nowhere in the report is it mentioned why Revd Gregory Chillman OSB resigned as trustee - i.e. that he had been placed on restricted covenant, and barred from public ministry and from access to children. I would regard that as a significant lie by omission.

The report mentions the following about inspections carried out during the year.

The School was inspected in November 2009 and the results were highly successful. The published report stated that the School was highly successful in achieving its aims of providing good quality education and “teaching a way of living”. The pastoral care and personal development of the pupils are excellent. Teaching is strong, often excellent and at times inspirational.

No mention is made of the Supplementary Inspection carried out by the ISI in April 2010, which highlighted severe shortcomings in safeguarding procedures. Nor is any mention of the report of the Charity Commission's own two Statutory Inquiries, published in December 2009, which was highly critical of the trustees. This is a disgracefully partial report.

Then, the report makes this passing mention of safeguarding issues.

The School community was saddened for those affected by historical safeguarding issues. There were failures in the past and the School co-operated with the relevant authorities to help expose or punish those involved.

To be blunt, this is an insult to the victims and to the intelligence of all  those associated in any way with Ealing Abbey or St Benedict's School. The failures resulted in the conviction of Father David Pearce during the year being reported on, and this is apparently not considered worthy of any mention in the report at all. Second, it suggests that the abuse is "historical". Not so, incidents occurred during the year, which resulted in Social Services investigation, albeit not in any prosecutions. Thirdly, I notice weasel words in "the School co-operated with the relevant authorities", without mentioning whether the co-operation was pro-active, continuous or voluntary.

Later on, the report makes mention of the "Independent Review"

Independent Review
As a result of the historical safeguarding issues mentioned above, and due to the hurt and damage that they have caused and continue to cause, the Abbot commissioned a full independent review of the Monastery and School by Lord Carlile of Berriew QC. As well as looking at the history of abuse allegations, the review is considering policies for dealing with such allegations and other reassurance. This is likely to include a recommendation to strengthen the governance of the School by separating it from the overall governance of the Trust. It is hoped that this review will report in the summer or autumn of 2011.

The report is dated 24 June 2011. It seems that even back then, they had seen which way Lord Carlile's mind seemed to be working, and they have as a result resigned themselves to a split in the governance between the school and the rest of the trust, as I recommended in my evidence to Lord Carlile.

But the paragraph is still lying by omission. It has neglected to mention the other "Independent Review" commissioned by the Abbot during the year being reported on, and especially has failed to mention the circumstances under which it was prepared.

It seems as if the Trustees are still operating in denial mode. They are minimising the extent of the problems, omitting as many inconvenient facts as they think they can get away with, and seem still to be liberally throwing whitewash in all directions. In view of the huge scale of the failures and the widespread damage to children at the school which has resulted, this is a pathetically inadequate report.

Father Gregory Chillman

I've had a most interesting exchange of correspondence with Peter Turner, the Diocesan Safeguarding Adviser for the RC Diocese of Westminster, concerning Father Gregory Chillman. Although he was not named in the ISI Supplementary Report on St. Benedict's (they generally do not name individuals), the following passage from the report clearly refers to him.

A monk who had taught in the school a long time ago has recently come under investigation by social services. At the time of the follow-up visits he was living in the monastery under a restrictive covenant barring him from contact with children.

I asked Mr Turner a set of questions questions about Chillman, to whch he was kind enough to offer replies.


1. On what date did he resign as a Trustee?
A. Fr Gregory resigned as a trustee of Ealing Abbey on 29 May 2010 (I later learned that this was an error, it was 29th March 2010.)

2. Did St Benedict's make a Referral to the Independent Safeguarding Authority within a month of his resignation?
A. No, because it was unnecessary he ceased to be a trustee because he was no longer on the Abbot’s Council.

3. If not, was a Referral subsequently made, once the issue had been raised by the ISI?
A. A referral was made to the ISA in October 2010.

4. On what date and for what reason did he resign as Chaplain of St. Augustine's Priory School?
A. Due to age & ill health he resigned on 3 October 2010.

5. On what date and for what reason did he resign as Chairman of Governors of St. Augustine's Priory School?
A. As (4) above.

6. In the last 5 years has he been a governor of any other schools? If he is still a governor, please list the schools of which he is a governor. For any where he has resigned as a governor within the last 5 years, please give the school, the date and the reason.
A. Fr Gregory was a governor of the Gunnersbury School, but gave up that role some time ago.

7. What are the terms of the restrictive covenant referred to in the ISI report?
A. Fr Gregory has no public ministry.

8. Is the restrictive covenant mentioned in the ISI report still in force on the same terms?
A. Yes

9. If the restrictive covenant has been modified or cancelled, please indicate the date on which this occurred, and the reasons for the change.
A. N/A. 

10. Is Father Gregory Chillman still resident at Ealing Abbey?
A. Yes

This was very interesting to me, because it is at odds with information that has previously been provided by St. Benedict's. At the safeguarding meeting with parents last September, I understand that although Chillman wasn't mentioned by name, this bit of the ISI report was raised, and the Abbot and Headmaster assured parents that "almost all" the restrictions had been lifted. The implication seems to have been that there was in investigation, the allegations were without foundation, and therefore almost all the restrictions have been lifted. But according to the information from Peter Turner, this is not true. The restrictions on Father Gregory Chillman remain in force on the same terms that applied at the time of the ISI inspection in April 2010.

The ISI Supplementary Report on St. Benedict's included the following as Recommendation 1.

1. Ensure that any staff or members of the religious community live away from the school, if they are subject to allegations of misconduct related to safeguarding or convicted of wrongdoing.

After a good deal of kicking and screaming, and extensive correspondence with the ISI and the DfE, this recommendation was eventually carried out with respect to Father Stanislaus Hobbs, who no longer lives at Ealing Abbey. But it hasn't been carried out with respect to Father Gregory Chillman, who remains at Ealing Abbey living under restricted covenant. The ISI criticised the use of restrictive covenants, since they had already failed to prevent abuse occurring at Ealing Abbey.

And then there is the issue of St. Augustine's School. Father Gregory Chillman remained chaplain and Chairman of Governors of St. Augustine's School for several months after he was placed on restricted covenant and denied any public ministry.

Did the trustees of St. Augustine's (including the Bishop of Arundel & Brighton) know that their chairman of governors had been put on restricted ministry?

If they didn't know, then Chillman himself was almost certainly breaching the terms of his restrictive covenant by remaining in the post. And I find it inconceivable that Abbot Martin Shipperlee didn't know about Chillman's role at St. Augustine's, and so he should have informed the St. Augustine's Trustees himself, and ought to have required Chillman's resignation.

If the St. Augustine's Trustees did know about Chillman's restrictive covenant and did nothing for several months, then they chose to retain the services of Chillman as chaplain and Chairman of Governors when they knew he had been placed on restricted covenant and barred from access to children. Negligence towards the safety of the pupils seems about the kindest interpretation that could be put on this.

The ISI inspected St. Augustine's in March 2010, with a follow-up visit in May. This overlaps with the supplementary inspection visits to St. Benedict's which took place on 30th April and 17th May. The ISI were definitely aware of the connection between the schools through Father Gregory Chillman, because I told them. It is inconceivable that the ISI, in the course of their inspection visits and subsequent correspondence, made no mention to St. Augustine's of Chillman's restrictive covenant and his unsuitability for the role. And yet he remained in place.

Teacher A

The Statement of Grounds contains this about Teacher A.

11. [Teacher A] was employed at the School from 1st September 2007, was suspended from 7th February 2008 (at which time she was already on sick leave) and her employment ended on 31st May 2008. The suspension was imposed on the ground that [Teacher A]'s CRB disclosure contained information relating to her husband and son which she said was inaccurate and was pending an amended disclosure. The Headmistress decided that under the statutory and guidance provisions then applicable referral was not required or appropriate. After speaking to Mrs. Culligan, the Headmistress made inquiries of the Independent Safeguarding Authority and was informed that [Teacher A] was "definitely not referral material". The Headmistress subsequently informed Mrs. Culligan of this.

This is about as uninformative as the statement about Teacher B. But it isn't what the ISI criticised Mrs Gumley Mason about. During the inspection visit, the reporting inspector asked if there had been any instances of staff who had left for reasons other than retirement, promotion, relocation etc.

In response, Mrs Gumley Mason mentioned Teacher A. She said that Teacher A had originally received a good reference from her previous school, but that the retiring head of the school had subsequently phoned her to tell her that Teacher A had done a voiceover for some sexually explicit material. Mrs Gumley Mason said that Teacher A had been dismissed immediately.

The reporting inspector asked what what action Mrs Gumley Mason had taken in notifying the appropriate authorities about the circumstances under which Teacher A had left. The response was that no action had been taken.

Again, the ISI obtained a letter subsequently sent by Mrs Gumley Mason to Ealing Children's Services, and again it did not contain the complete story as reported to the inspector, specifically omitting any reference to the telephone call from the teacher's previous employer. ISI checked with the Department for Education to see whether a referral had been made to ISA. Some months after the inspection, DfE wrote back to ISI confirming that no referral had been made, either at the time or subsequently.

One the available evidence, the ISI concluded that the LADO's advice should have been sought at the time, and that a referral should have been made.

The most remarkable thing about the case of Teacher A is that if Mrs Gumley Mason had simply kept quiet about Teacher A, the chances are quite good that the ISI would never have learned anything of the case. In essence, Mrs Gumley Mason has been betrayed by her own mouth.

It would seem that Mrs Gumley Mason was genuinely ignorant of the law on safeguarding and referrals. If she knew that she should have made a referral but didn't, then she would have kept very quiet about the case of Teacher A.But what appears to have happened is that she freely told the inspector about the case, apparently under the impression that she had done nothing wrong.

Such ignorance on the part of a headteacher and designated teacher for child protection is terrifying. The safety of 500 girls is at least in part dependent on the headteacher knowing what should be done in such cases.

It isn't even as if Mrs Gumley Mason is new to the job and still learning her responsibilities. She became Headmistress of the school in 1995. If I am correct in believing her actions are down to ignorance, then this ignorance has in all probability been going on for years and years. And the resulting shortcomings in child protection have gone undetected by probably three successive OFSTED inspections.

In a way, Mrs Gumley Mason has been very unlucky. The school has recently joined an Independent Schools Council member organisation and so the ISI become responsible for inspecting the school instead of OFSTED. Also, Father Gregory Chillman had recently come to the attention of the ISI in connection with the safeguarding failures at St. Benedict's. Had OFSTED been inspecting, or had Father Gregory Chillman not been chaplain and chairman of governors, then there is every chance that little or no effort would have been made to check the quality of safeguarding at the school, and you as parents would still have had no idea what was going on.

But then again, had the safeguarding been done properly and according to the law, there would have been no need to rely on luck.

The safeguarding meeting at St Augustine's

I've now had a some accounts of the meeting, and can describe it to you. Apparently about 50 parents attended.

The chairman of the Governors, Professor Anne Hemingway, opened the meeting with a 10 minute talk with details of and how they were instituting their new safeguarding policy which is on their website. She apologised for the failings in safeguarding and assured the room that the school would do better. To this end the safeguarding policy had been redrafted and had been checked against the Ealing yellow book, which parents could view online. She said that this policy had been passed by the school's safeguarding committee and copies had gone to all members of staff who had signed to say they had read it. Mrs Gumley Mason spoke about CRBs and the central register of appointments, but a blank proforma showing what details were recorded was not provided to parents, and there was no initial explanation of what the central register of appointments is, why it exists and what it does.

Parents were then given the opportunity to ask questions.

A parent asked about the article in the Gazette and expressed concern about Father Gregory. Mrs Gumley Mason said that his term of office as chair of governors had come to an end and that he had decided to retire because he was 80 and not in good health. She denied that the school had any concerns about his suitability to work with children. She was asked if there was a requirement to report him and she said something to the effect that he was not an employee of the school, but of the diocese and so no.

Another parent asked about CRB checks and was assured by Professor Hemingway that these had all now been completed. Mrs Gumley Mason said that the problem had been that the school had applied Ofsted  requirements but that ISI requirements were more stringent.

There were questions on the subject of the ISI report and concerns about the safeguarding issues and why the school and Mrs Gumley-Mason had not been open with parents about the problems. Several paraents were irritated that it appeared that there appeared to be an attempt to hush up the report, and that the school had taken the ISI to court to prevent publication. Mrs Gumley Mason explained that the school had used the ISI complaints procedure because there had been 'factual inaccuracies' in the report, and they had then decided to take out an injunction so that they would not be forced to publish an inaccurate report. They were not trying to hush up the report but wanted to deal with areas they were not happy with before it was issued. She did not explain what these inaccuracies were.

Another parent commented, to the general agreement of the floor, that they would have liked to have been informed what was going on, and went on to say that they felt that communication was a big concern. Things happened and they were not told. A more general discussion about poor communication ensued and another parent said that she found the letters the head wrote to parents confusing and hard to understand and felt that, in particular the covering letter sent out with the report was lacking in clarity and did not apologise for the failings but in some ways trivialised them. Mrs Gumley Mason listened and nodded, but made no justification

Some parents wanted Teacher A and Teacher B identified – Mrs Gumley Mason said she would enquire with the ISI as to whether she was allowed to do this and come back with a response.


About costs, Mrs Gumley Mason said that the school had legal insurance. it. She did not, however, state how much the total cost had been or whether the legal insurance had covered the full cost.

Another parent then said it was good to hear from a governor and asked if there were any parent governors. Mrs Gumley Mason said there were two: Professor Hemingway and Mrs Grewal, although Mrs Grewal would soon cease to be a parent governor as her daughters would soon leave the school, although she would continue to be a governor. So, Mrs Gumley Mason was looking round for another governor, maybe someone with expertise in law. A parent then said she was concerned about this approach to recruiting a governor and said she felt it should be a more open process, maybe with an election. Another parent added that she agreed with this and had children in three different schools and that she felt elected parent governors were the right way forward. Professor Hemingway wrote this down and Mrs Gumley Mason nodded and added that 'this would be a matter for the governors'.

A parent suggested that regular parent forums would be a good way forward as they had welcomed the chance to ask questions. Professor Hemingway said it was a good suggestion and wrote it down.

A parent then asked about this blog, which most of those in attendance were aware of. She asked if it would do permanent damage to the school. A member of staff said he thought not. Mrs Gumley Mason agreed.

Throughout the meeting Professor Hemingway seems to have been firmly in control and Mrs Gumley Mason appeared flustered and not always coherent. There were other questions about ICT which are not relevant to this blog. There were no other governors present (at least not who identified themselves) and there were no Trustees present.

The above account is a synthesis of various accounts that have been provided to me. I wasn't there, and so I have no means of knowing for certain how accurate all this is. But the various accounts did agree substantially on points of fact, so I'm fairly confident about this.

Assuming that the accounts are accurate, I have concerns I have with some of the answers given, which seem not to be correct.

ISI requirements for CRB checks are more stringent than OFSTED's.
If this is really what Mrs Gumley Mason said, then it is complete balderdash. Both organisations operate according to the same legal framework, and apply the letter of the law in this respect, as supplemented by guidance produced by the DfE. It is entirely possible that OFSTED, in its 2006 inspection, neglected to make a proper review of the Central Register of Appointments, but to suggest that OFSTED and the ISI apply different requirements is completely false.

It isn't known whether the school can disclose the names of Teacher A and Teacher B
Of course they can., They already have. Their names are in the Statement of Grounds and so are now out in the public domain. Any parent who wishes to find out the names need only email me, and I will send you a scanned copy of the Statement of Grounds, complete with the names. I assure you that the fact that you have asked me will remain confidential. Alternatively, you can write to the High Court and ask them to post or fax it to you. They might charge you a modest fee of a few pounds.

Father Gregory doesn't need to be reported to the ISA because he wasn't an employee of the school
Complete rubbish. He was chairman of governors. The rules apply to governors just as much as they do to staff. Moreover, the rules on referrals to the Independent Safeguarding Authority when somebody leaves the establishment are equally applicable to all those working with children in any capacity. If at the time of his resignation either as chaplain or as chair of governors, there were issues concerning his suitability to work with children, then by law the school is obliged to make a referral to the ISA.

I'm still seriously concerned about the state of the school, but in fairness I must report one positive aspect. The parents were provided with a copy of the new version of the safeguarding policy, and three appendices, each in the form of a flowchart which summarises the procedures. They have been forwarded to me. Appendix 5 addresses the procedure to be followed in the event of an allegation of abuse against somebody at the school. I'm pleased to say that it clearly states that the LADO (Local Authority Designated Officer for Child Protection) is always contacted in such cases. That's the good news, and I'm very pleased about it. It is most definitely a step in the right direction. But the main text of the policy does not align with the flow chart, and there is no indication as to whether the text or the flowchart is authoritative in the event of a discrepancy between them. This is not so good. But let us celebrate such positive steps as have been taken. With regard to this aspect of the policy, all that is now needed is for the text to align with the flow chart, without the weasel words currently present.

St. Augustine's in the Gazette

You might care to buy a copy of today's Ealing Gazette. There is an article about St. Augustine's on page 7. The headline is

School 'failed to protect children from abuse risks'
Ealing: Inspectors highlight number of concerns

The article briefly but accurately summarises ths issues of the ISI report, and quotes from it, pointing out the failings in CRB checks, the failure to make the proper reports to the Independent Safeguarding Authority and Ealing Social Services, the fact that the school's child protection policy didn't meet legal requirements.

There is a quote from Mrs. Gumley-Mason at the end of the report, as follows.

Headteacher Mrs Gumley-Mason said: "The report is out in the public domain and nothing has been suppressed."

"Of the three people mentioned, two are retired and as far as I know the other is no longer in the teaching profession or indeed in this country."

That bit about "nothing has been suppressed" is a lie. Last November, on the eve of the scheduled publication of the ISI Report, the school took out an injunction against the ISI to prevent publication, seeking judicial review in the High Court of the decision. So of course the report has been suppressed. It has been suppressed for four months. It is just that the school has been unable to suppress it for any longer.

In its submission to the court, the school claimed that the ISI's report "is based on errors of fact and law, is unfairly inconsistent with other reports and is a judgment which no reasonable inspecting body could have reached".

To claim that a judgment is not "reasonable" is a very strong claim. This is legal jargon for saying that no unbiased person with two brain cells to rub together could possibly have reached the same conclusions. In other words, the school was alleging that the ISI was either grossly incompetent or biased. They don't say which.

As for "the three people mentioned", one is the former chaplain and chairman of governors, not named in the Gazette but whom we all know is Father Gregory Chillman, and two are former teachers. Their current status does not reduce one bit the school's obligations to send referrals to the Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA). If one of the teachers is no longer in the teaching profession, this is no thanks to Mrs Gumley-Mason, because this should have been ensured by her sending the proper report to the ISA.

Carlile Report delayed as predicted

As I predicted last month, publication of the Carlile report is being delayed. And the reason I stated is the one which has in fact been given.

The school has put a notice up on its website. The reason given for the delay is the need to avoid disrupting the forthcoming trial of Father David Pearce and John Maestri, on three charges each of indecent assault against a boy.

Let's get some dates sorted here. The trial of Pearce and Maestri is scheduled to start on 4th July and last for 4 days. If a conviction is obtained, there will almost certainly be an adjournment for sentencing, that is normally about 6 weeks. So sentencing would be sometime in mid-August.

But Pearce and Maestri aren't the only former priests and teachers against whom prosecutions might occur. Abbot Lawrence Soper was required to return to the UK and answer police questions.

And in the ISI Supplementary report on St. Benedict's, there is the the following item

(i) Legal action has been initiated in connection with a previous member of the religious community

I still don't yet know who that is. It isn't Pearce, Hobbs, Chillman or Soper, it is somebody else. And I don't know where the legal action has got to, but if it is or becomes a criminal prosecution, that's another trial that may occur.

So there are potentially a number of overlapping prosecutions that may yet happen. If a pending prosecution is a justification for delaying the report, it may be delayed for a lot longer than is currently anticipated.

But even with a publication date during the summer holidays, there is zero chance of any of Lord Carlile's recommendations being implemented before the end of this academic year. So for instance we are likely to have the current travesty of a child protection policy remaining in force for some time yet.

Remember, at the Safeguarding meeting held last September, Cleugh and Shipperlee seemed to try to express two mutually contradictory positions. First they claimed that all the abuse was "historical" and that there was no risk to current pupils. And at the same time they were claiming that the matter was so serious that it required that they get a Lord and a QC to come and make an inquiry about it.

And since then there has been a deafening silence on what improvements they consider might be needed in terms of their safeguarding policies and procedures. And now the Carlile report is delayed pending the Pearce and Maestri trial. There is nothing in the headmasters' letter which suggests any kind of interim publication which would enable the school to get on with taking measures to improve things.

There just doesn't seem to be any great urgency to do anything.

So if you are wondering whether to keep your child there next year (or even to start sending your child there in September), you can't count on any improvements having been made by the time the autumn term starts. You will be sending your children to a school where where there is a history of child abuse and where the current child protection policy is inadequate.

Parents, are you satisfied with this state of affairs? If you aren't, you need to get together and start deciding to do something about it. The school isn't going to help you. The ISI feels it has done its job in issuing the report and it thinks it is the DfE's job to insist on remedial action. And the DfE appears to be intensively engaged in looking the other way as hard as it can. You're on your own.

Questions for Mrs Gumley Mason

If you are a parent of a child at St. Augustine's, here are some questions which you may be interested in learning about. They are all questions which Mrs. Gumley Mason knows or at least ought to know the answers to.

• When was the first draft of the ISI report provided to the school?
• What modifications have been made relative to this draft in the final version?
• What explanations did the ISI give for any changes made?
• Did the school take legal action against the ISI?
• What was the purpose of the legal action?
• How much has been spent on this legal action, in costs, court fees and fees to the school's own solicitors?
• How much of the headmistress's time has been spent on matters connected with the legal action?
• Who made the decision to proceed with legal action?
• When was the decision made?
• Was the decision formally approved at a meeting of the Governors? If so, when?
• Was the decision formally approved at a meeting of the Trustees? If so, when?
• When was the action started?
• What aspect(s) of the ISI report did the school object to?
• Has the action been withdrawn? If so, when and why?
• Does the school have any reason now to criticise the ISI's approach or anything in the content of the report?
• Who is the new "independent governor" who has been appointed?
• Was he known to the headmistress, any other members of staff or any governors or trustees prior to the search to appoint a new governor being started? If so, what is his connection with the person or persons concerned?
• What version of the safeguarding policy was in force at the time of the OFSTED inspection in 2006?
• Did it share any of the weaknesses recently criticised by the ISI?
• For how long has the Central Register of Appointments not been properly maintained?
• How many staff have been permitted to supervise children before their CRB checks were completed?
• What is the longest period that a member of staff was permitted to supervise children before the CRB check was received?
• What were the allegations against the two members of staff whom the ISI stated should have been referred to the ISA on their departure?
• Have those referrals now been made?
• Have referrals of anybody else been made to the ISA (or prior to 2009 to the Teacher Misconduct Section of the DfE) within the last 10 years up to the present day?
• Are any referrals to the ISA currently being prepared or expected to be sent in the near future?
• Have there been any incidents or allegations made against any current members of staff, governors or trustees, which if the present requirement to report all such allegations automatically to the LADO had been in place should have been so reported? If so, how many and will they now be reported to the LADO?
• At the school, have there been any incidents involving or allegations made against Father Gregory Chillman, relating to his suitability to supervise children? If so, what are they, and what was done in response?
• When did Father Gregory Chillman resign as chaplain and Chairman of Governors? Why?

If you ask any of these questions, then I would be very interested to learn what the replies are. Even a refusal to reply will be most illuminating.

Mrs Gumley Mason, I know you read this blog. Perhaps you would care to set the record straight by writing a further letter to parents clearly setting out your answers to these questions.

Father Stanislaus Hobbs

Since my last post, the Ealing Abbey website has been updated. Father Stanislaus Hobbs is now listed among the "monks resident elsewhere". His current address is not given and he can apparently be contacted c/o the Abbey.

Father Gregory Chillman is still listed as resident at the Abbey.

The Headmaster's Newsletter

Well, the Febuary Newsletter has now been published. And now down in the corner of page 10 is a single paragraph about the Carlile Report.

The School has now fully implemented all the recommendations made in the follow-up Inspection report and we now await the report from the Independent Review on safeguarding commissioned by Fr Abbot. Lord Carlile has amassed a great volume of evidence and is now collating it before writing the report. It now seems unlikely that his report will be presented to Fr Abbot until the end of this term. You will be kept fully informed of any developments. We hope to have more news by the time of the Parental Forum in March.

This is remarkable, not so much as for what it says, but for what it doesn't say. Allow me to use my imagination to fill in some of the gaps.

The School has now fully implemented all the recommendations made in the follow-up Inspection report (but we aren't going to tell you what we have actually done to implement it, lest you try and compare it with the original recommendations and decide that we haven't done enough) and we now await the report from the Independent Review on safeguarding commissioned by Fr Abbot. Lord Carlile has amassed a great volume of evidence (despite our great efforts to ensure that publicity for the inquiry was absolutely minimal) and is now collating it before writing the report. It now seems unlikely that his report will be presented to Fr Abbot until the end of this term (but don't imagine that you will be allowed to see it then. We have no intention of publishing the report for a long time after that). You will be kept fully informed of any developments (but perhaps not by us). We hope to have more news by the time of the Parental Forum in March (actually, we hope to have no more news at all by then since every new bit of news on this subject seems to be bad).

In particular, the first statement seems very unlikely to be true. If you recall, the ISI recommendations were as follows

1. Ensure that any staff or members of the religious community live away from the school, if they are subject to allegations of misconduct related to safeguarding or convicted of wrongdoing.

Father Stanislaus Hobbs and Father Gregory Chillman are both still listed on the Abbey website as monks resident at the Abbey. Both have been placed on "restricted ministry", though I understand that "most of" the restrictions on Chillman have been lifted. So at best, it seems unlikely that this recommendation has yet been implemented in full.

2. Follow the advice given to render the safeguarding policy a model of excellence in its wording, implementation and review.

As parents you are in the position of trying to compare the school's actions (which have not been disclosed) against the ISI's detailed recommendations (which have also not been disclosed). Feeling confident that all is well? This the the safety of your sons and daughters we are talking about.

One thing is certain. The school's current child protection policy as published on the school website is still the one issued on 22 September 2010, which is decidedly not a model of excellence, as I have previously described. So, it is pretty clear that this action is not complete, if indeed they have even made a start on it.

3. Ensure that referrals are always made to the Independent Safeguarding Authority when appropriate. For historical cases, ensure that all relevant information is passed to the Independent Safeguarding Authority.

The one decently written clause of the school's current child protection policy is a requirement to notify the ISA if a teacher leaves or is sacked in circumstances where his or her fitness to supervise children is in question. But this recommendation makes it clear that this clause of the policy was ignored in practice. Now you are being given a general assurance that all is now well, and yet the policy has not been changed, you are given no information at all as to changes in practice that will ensure that the ISA is notified in future, and you have been given no information at all about how many historical notifications have now been made retrospectively.

Still feeling confident?

4. Give greater emphasis to safeguarding in the school personal, social, health and citizenship (PSHCE) programme and reflect this in the school improvement plan.

Have you seen the school improvement plan? It appears not to be a published document. So how can you tell whether this has been done? Does the improvement here achieve what you would regard as a reasonable degree of emphasis? How can you tell? Have you seen the new PSHCE curriculum?

Still confident?

5. Emphasise awareness raising and training in safeguarding across the whole community of school, Abbey and parish, with formal contact between the child protection officers.

Do you realise that the Ealing Abbey website still does not have a safeguarding policy for the Abbey and Parish? The Safeguarding information page contains the following procedure-free statement.

The Parish of St Benedict, Ealing Abbey, is committed to the Safeguarding policies of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, to take all reasonable steps to protect children, young people and vulnerable adults from any form of abuse or maltreatment and to promote a safe environment for them. This commitment flows from the fact that we are all made in the image of God and the Church's common belief in the dignity and uniqueness of every human life. We start from the principle that each person has a right to expect the highest level of care and protection, love, encouragement and respect that we can give. We will liaise closely and openly with statutory agencies to ensure that any concerns or allegations of abuse that are raised are promptly reported and properly responded to, victims supported and perpetrators held to account.

But a pious statement of intent does not make a policy. There are no procedures. Admittedly that page does include a link to the website of the CSAS procedures, but there is no undertaking to ensure that they are followed, and even if there were, there is no means of ensuring this, since the CSAS procedures are general rather than specific to the individual setting, do not allocate responsibility to named individuals (they can't, being general) and clearly state that they are regularly updated, so nobody is in a position to know what their responsibilities are supposed to be, unless they review every page of  the procedures on a weekly basis. And the procedures are split across literally dozens of pages. It is one of the most user-unfriendly websites it has ever been my misfortune to have to navigate.

The civil action successfully brought by C occurred in January 2006. It is now five years on, and still it seems that the response of the trustees remains characterised by foot-dragging allied to the hope that the problem will all somehow just go away.

St. Augustine's Priory

There seems to be something of a delay in the publication of the ISI inspection report for St. Augustine's Priory School. In July the headmistress made the following comment in a letter to parents.

Where is it?

I have delayed writing this letter to you in the hope that we would be in receipt of the ISI report. It has yet to materialise. When it does, the School will have the chance to correct factual inaccuracies and it will then go back to ISI for amendments and final editing and then be returned to us when we will have a fortnight within which to make it available to all parents.

I believe the ISI inspection took place in April. For publication of the report to be so far delayed is extremely unusual. Given the great problems that St. Benedict's has been having with safeguarding recently, which has resulted in the Trustees commissioning an inquiry by Lord Carlile into safeguarding failures there, I suspect that the ISI will be taking especial care over this report because of the association between St. Augustine's and Ealing Abbey. Father Gregory Chillman was until recently Chairman of Governors of the school and also Chaplain. The report has not yet been published on the ISI website, but when it finally does appear, you will be able to see it here.

And there is this odd statement about "factual inaccuracies" in the headmistress's letter. It is almost as if she is expecting that there will be statements in the report which she regards as factual inaccuracies. She is hardly likely to complain about factual inaccuracies which are complimentary about the school, so it would seem that she may be expecting adverse comment that she wishes to present to parents as being inaccurate.

And if there is adverse comment, given the sensitivity of the ISI to criticism about its ability to detect safeguarding problems, one can reasonably speculate that the ISI may have concerns about safeguarding at the school. Certainly the school's safeguarding policy is highly unimpressive, even though it has been comprehensively updated (in fact rewritten from scratch) as compared to the set of utterly useless procedure-free platitudes that the policy used to consist of at the beginning of this year.

The present version of the policy talks of "appropriate actions" far too often without defining what actions are appropriate, and doesn't specify that all allegations of child sexual abuse will automatically be reported to the LADO. According to section 2.4 of the policy, the EYFS Nominated Safeguarding Children Officer is supposed to report allegations to Ofsted and ISI. This is completely wrong, since those bodies are not investigating bodies and have no power to do anything with the report. The reports should go to the LADO. The latest version of the St. Benedict's Child Protection Policy (the third update published this year) has finally got round to making explicit reference to the LADO in its policy.

The ISI Supplementary Report - 2

Next we deal with some of the things which the inspectors found.

The reporting of allegations

The allegations against Fr DP were referred to social services by the school following disclosure by a pupil. The school’s safeguarding records since 2003 do not mention any other report to social services in connection with concerns related to staff, volunteers, trustees or monks. All have been family or other matters. Safeguarding contacts have also been maintained with the Westminster Diocesan Safeguarding Commission. The Abbot made a statement disclosing the cases of Fr DP and another monk, and each headmaster issued copies in March 2006, with covering letters to parents.

It is very important to realise that under successive Education Acts since about 1959, schools have a statutory duty to return a Notification to the authorities (until recently the Department for Education, now the Independent Safeguarding Authority) whenever a teacher or governor resigns or is sacked in circumstances where their suitability to work with children is in question. The Trustees fulfil the role of governors. But since 2003, two trustees have resigned in precisely these circumstances. And yet, the ISI reports that the school's records make no mention of any such notification.

Clearly, there was no Notification when Fr Stanislaus Hobbs resigned as a Trustee in 2005 following his arrest (as described in the Charity Commission report), or when Fr Gregory Chillman resigned last April following the Social Services investigation.

Since the school hasn’t done so in the case of Chillman even when they knew they were under the spotlight, it is reasonable to think that the school has never sent a Notification apart from this one time. That means not when Pearce "retired" as Junior School Headmaster in 1993 to become Bursar instead, and not when Maestri suddenly resigned in the early 1980s.

The redeployment of Pearce would be illegal today under the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006 – but a Notification should have been returned at the time because there was no other instrument to advise the Department for Education of abusive teachers.

John Maestri subsequently obtained a teaching position elsewhere after abruptly leaving St. Benedict’s.

But we aren’t in a position to know for certain about the lack of Notifications in these two cases, because the ISI hasn’t gone back further than 2003 (when they previously inspected the school). This is wrong – they should go back as far into history as they need to in order to get to the bottom of a case which has been reported to them since their last inspection. They haven’t done that here.

At the time of the follow-up inspections, the school did not have a fully established policy for reporting directly to the Department for Education and Skills (later the Department for Children, Schools and Families, and currently the Department for Education) or to the Independent Safeguarding Authority, responsible for such referrals since 20 January 2009. The advisability of making such referrals is now clearly understood even when there may not be a strict legal obligation to do so, and an historical referral was made in May 2010.

This is not correct. The school does have a written policy on this. It is in section 26 of the school's Child Protection policy. The relevant paragraph reads as follows:

"If the School ceases to use the services of a member of staff (or a governor or volunteer) because they are unsuitable to work with children, a compromise agreement will not be used and there will be a prompt and detailed report to the Independent Safeguarding Authority. Any such incidents will be followed by a review of the safeguarding procedures within the School, with a report being presented to the Governors without delay."

That is perfectly clear and unambigouous. There's only one small problem. The school doesn't apply it. And by not applying it at the times of the resignations of Hobbs and Chillman, the school has broken the law. Twice.

If a school doesn't make a Notification, an abusive teacher is able to get another job involving children, since the Independent Safeguarding Authority doesn't know to warn a subsequent school that the teacher may be unfit to work with children. This means that there may be more victims. John Maestri was able to get another teaching job after he left St. Benedict's, and so continued to have access to children. I don't know if he abused any of them. I sincerely hope not.

This is very important. It means that merely getting the written policy into a fit state is not enough. The policy is not worth the paper it is written on if the Trustees and Headmaster are not prepared to ensure that it is implemented fully. What is needed is to change the culture at the school so that staff and trustees know their safeguarding obligations and are prepared to fulfil them. This is clear evidence that at the moment they aren’t.

The nature of the relationship between the school and the Abbey

The Abbot and the Prior are ex officio trustees, and of the four other trustees two are elected by the monastic community and two appointed by the Abbot. The trustees are the same as the Abbot’s Council and have ultimate responsibility for the school and the Abbey.

There are only 14 monks resident in the abbey, and they are all under the authority of the Abbot. So it makes for a limited pool of talent from which to choose trustees responsible for running a charity with an income of £11m. And since they are all subject to the authority of the Abbot, you can’t really get much in the way of independent thinking going on.
   
In any independent school, only the Board of Governors can get rid of a bad governor. In the case of St Benedict’s, the Abbot appoints the Prior and two other trustees. The other two trustees are elected by the remaining monks. So the Abbot and his appointees form a majority of the trustees. There’s no mechanism for getting rid of bad trustees if the Abbot supports them. And as far as I can see, there is no means at all of getting rid of an Abbot who fails in his duties.

Chillman was appointed as a trustee on 6 April 2009 and resigned in April 2010. Hobbs resigned as a Trustee on 23 September 2005.

Boy choristers, aged from eight to thirteen, number about 20. They belong to the Abbey male voice choir and sing in Masses in the Abbey. In addition to the boys, there are six professional adult singers, known as ‘lay clerks’.

For most pupils, contact with the Abbey is reported (by the school and pupils) to be confined to whole-school Masses and formal occasions such as Remembrance Day. Junior school pupils attend Mass weekly. The school stresses the separation between the school and the Abbey. Twenty years ago the situation was different, when the monks were heavily involved in the school

What relevance any of this has for safeguarding is a mystery, unless the ISI takes the view that monks by definition form a greater hazard to children and should generally speaking be kept away from them. That would be a very curious attitude to take, certainly on the part of inspectors responsible for assessing a school's compliance with statutory obligations. In any case, the school's child protection policy should not be directed merely towards protecting children from monks, but rather towards protecting them from any abusive adult who may be on the premises.

The steps that the trustees have taken to balance their responsibilities to the different classes of beneficiaries

In addition to the use of restrictive covenants, the trustees have taken other steps to balance their responsibilities for monks and pupils. A lay person on the Board of School Advisors (governors, including trustees and others) was appointed as the child protection governor for 2009 to 2010, and her responsibility for safeguarding has very recently been assumed by an advisor who has previously carried out work as a schools inspector. The minutes of the Board of Advisors for June 2009 mention various sessions of child protection training. The school has provided training for the Board of School Advisors, including the trustees.

Neither the name of the designated governor nor her responsibilities are mentioned in the current child protection policy for the school, nor so far as I can tell are these details mentioned anywhere else on the school website. Unless the responsibilities are defined and publicly stated, there is no means by which anybody with a child protection concern (e.g. a parent) can contact her. She's therefore useless and her existence is an irrelevance.
   
We aren’t told what training has been provided by the school, and whether it was up to the standards defined by Ealing Safeguarding Children Board.

The inspection evidence is that the pupils are confident, relaxed, young people with a high standard of personal development, happy in the school and quick to recommend it for others. They have members of staff whom they regard as approachable to help with concerns. The only monks with whom they are familiar are the chairman of trustees and the three members of the monastic community who have school responsibilities. The choristers are escorted for Mass and choir practice. They are proud of their role as choristers and enjoyed their recent visit to France.

The fact that the pupils appear “confident” and “happy” is not evidence that they are not being abused. If you look at the film Chosen which won a BAFTA for Best Single Documentary in 2007, you’ll find victims describing how good they were at hiding their misery. And paedophiles are very good and drawing children into complicity and persuading them to keep quiet. If the ISI doesn't know this, then they are incredibly incompetent. If they do know it, then they are complicit in misleading parents as to the safety of the school.

Choirboys can be proud of being choirboys, and still be being abused. They are singled out for special attention for their singing abilities, and this can be used as a precursor to their being groomed for other activities. Statements to the effect that choirboys are proud of their role have no place in a report such as this, since it can be abused by the school to provide reassurance to parents that all is well when an objective examination of procedures would reveal otherwise. That the ISI includes such statements is further evidence of their incompetence in safeguarding matters.

On the other hand, the school had not made all necessary referrals directly to the appropriate authorities and the use of restrictive conditions is not altogether convincing, since the restrictions were not adequate in the case of Fr DP and the failure to implement them occasioned serious criticism in the Charity Commission report of 15 December 2009. Shortcomings were also apparent in the school’s safeguarding policy and in the single central register of appointments. An obvious safeguarding emphasis is not included in the school improvement action plan 2009 to 2010 or in the programme for personal, social, health and citizenship education (PSHCE).

This is far more important. This is evidence that the procedures of the school are severely lacking, to the point that even the ISI makes it rather gently clear that the school has broken the law.

Let's make this perfectly clear. The school has broken the law by permitting known abusers to leave quietly or to remain on site at the Abbey. The school has failed to return Notifications under the Education Acts which has the effect of permitting known abusers to go and get jobs working with children.

And don't you love that little British understatement "the use of restrictive conditions is not altogether convincing". Of course it isn't - the policy quite simply failed in the case of Father David Pearce!
   
The ISI does not say which “Shortcomings were also apparent” and they should – we need to clearly understand what was wrong – there are many important matters to do with CRB and much else in the single central register of appointments. Why was this not noticed in any previous inspection?

The Abbot’s Council has considered children safest if an offending monk is well looked after in the company of others and kept under restrictions. This view acknowledges that the monastery is not a prison or a hospital, but sees difficulty in finding other monasteries to which a monk might go. The commitment to trust within the community and to St Benedict’s rule of love and forgiveness appears on occasion to have overshadowed responsibility for children’s welfare, as in the case of Fr DP.

That's an incredibly charitable way of putting it. Let's describe the policy of "restrictive covenants" in simple terms. Monks against whom credible complaints of sexual abuse have been made are permitted to continue living next to the school which their monastery runs. Although the monks are nominally placed under restriction, few people are permitted to know that the restrictions exist, and even fewer are given accurate information as to the reason for the restrictions. As a result, the restrictions are not adequately enforced.

This nonsensical and foolish policy failed completely with Pearce, demonstrates no understanding at all of paedophilia, and indicates a far greater concern for the reputation of the Abbey and the individual monks than for the safety of the children in their care.
   
It’s incredibly convenient that that this policy of “love and forgiveness” permits the Abbot to keep abusive monks at the Abbey and not report their crimes to the civil authorities.

In view of the past safeguarding incidents, largely involving current or previous members of the monastic community, the inspection has deliberately included detailed guidance to bring the school’s safeguarding policy and arrangements to the highest possible standard.

In other words, the ISI is now acknowledging that the school’s safeguarding policy and arrangements fall below that standard, a fact the ISI completely missed in its glowing November 2009 inspection and also its previous inspections in 2003/4.

What the ISI carefully does not mention is that this additional inspection was carried out at the specific request of the DfE (formerly DCSF), and that the DfE's request was made as a result of me expressing concerns to Jeannette Pugh, Director of Safeguarding at the DfE. Had I not gone over ISI’s head to speak to DfE, there’s no reason to think that ISI would have acted at all.

We really need to know what the “detailed guidance” is which the ISI has referred to, so we can evaluate it. Unless we are informed of this, as soon as the ISI leave, the school is likely to return to its old ways. Parents are the only ones who can police a child protection policy, but without knowing what it should be, they are helpless.

The ISI Supplementary Report - 1

Neither the school nor the ISI comes out very well from this report. I think it's about time we subjected the report to the same degree of analysis as the St. Benedict's School Child Protection Policy.

Firstly, I notice that the school has been careful at the time of writing not to put a copy of the report up on its website. I'm not surprised. You have to decode the language, but make no mistake, this is a public verbal kicking the like of which the ISI has never in its history delivered to a school. And this is on the subject of child protection - the safety of the pupils at the school. But the report is available on the ISI website for you to view or download and print.

Let's start with the first introductory paragraph.

As a result of information provided by a member of the public, further work was conducted after the inspection of the school in November 2009 and after the publication of the senior and junior school reports. The information referred the inspectorate to public records of a total of six prosecutions or civil actions raised in connection with the Abbey and the school. At the time of the inspection, a number of these cases had not been brought to the attention of the inspectorate either by safeguarding agencies or by the school. This follow-up report has been prepared to update the findings in relation to these and related matters. At the time of the follow-up inspection, there were no allegations against current staff or governors at the school.

It will be no surprise to any regular readers here to learn that that I am the "member of the public" referred to in the first sentence. The report was commissioned from the ISI by the Department for Education, and their concerns about the school were raised as a result of me providing information to the ISI and the Department for Education about the school which ought to have been addressed in the ISI's November 2009 inspection.

And notice that this is not just about Father David Pearce. The opening paragraph refers to six (!) separate prosecutions or civil actions which had not been disclosed previously to the ISI.

By the way, don't treat the last sentence as any kind of assurance. The fact that "the time of the follow-up inspection, there were no allegations against current staff or governors at the school" is merely a matter of timing. There has been a recent allegation against Father Gregory Chillman, and he resigned as a Trustee and was placed in restricted ministry almost certainly less than a month before the first of the ISI visits on April 30th.

This in fact shows up a serious failing by the ISI - they should be reporting not the snapshot of how things are on the day of their visit, but everything that has happened during the time since the last inspection. Since this is a supplement to the November 2009 inspection, the inspection period extends back to January 2004 for the senior school and May 2003 for the junior school. During that time, there have been safeguarding issues with regard to two current Trustees - Father Gregory Chillman and Father Stanislaus Hobbs.

The fact that the ISI was not in possession of this information at its previous inspection has two possible causes - that the school failed to report it, or that the authorities failed to pass on the reports to the ISI. Later in the report, we will see that the cause is that the school failed to report.

It is vitally important that the school inspectors are given full details of all past incidents that have come to light since the last inspection, no matter when the incidents actually occurred. Only by knowing about the incidents can the inspectors discover whether they reveal shortcomings in the school's policies and procedures that need to be addressed. Note that a paedophile incident doesn't necessarily reveal a shortcoming in the school. it may be that there was nothing adverse known about the teacher before an incident, that the incident was discovered immediately, reported promptly and appropriate action taken to protect the children at the school. if parents were to hear that such prompt and effective action had been taken, in my view that would enhance a school's reputation as being a safe place for children. But if the school covers up incidents, the inspectors (and by extension, the parents) can't tell whether adequate action has been taken.

In paragraph 4.4 of the senior school report and paragraph 4.5 of the junior school report of the ISI inspections held on 9 to 12 November 2009, mention is made of ‘an independent review of the measures taken to minimise risk’ and it is stated that these had been fully implemented. This refers to a review of the risks posed by a monk resident in the monastery and not to the full diocesan safeguarding review, which was a review produced later, following a meeting with the Abbot on 18 November 2009 (see below).

What this means is that the ISI has supposedly seen a report of an "independent review" from "experts" which has never been published, and never previously been publicly referred to. The Abbot was apparently unaware that any such report had been compiled when I met him in September 2009, and yet the version of the child protection policy current at the time of the inspection (published on 1st September 2009) had been updated with the benefit of this "expert" advice. Quite frankly, this is not all that plausible. I shan't believe it unless and until the report of this "independent review" is published.

Summary of evidence

Two one-day follow-up visits were made (on 30 April and 17 May), the first of which was unannounced. Each visit was undertaken by two inspectors. Documentation was viewed, including welfare records, the central register of appointments, the safeguarding policy, and the full diocesan safeguarding review following the conviction of a member of the monastic community in October 2009. Interviews were held with those responsible for safeguarding and with groups of senior and junior pupils. Mass was attended in the Abbey.

So, this describes what they looked at this time. Quite frankly, as a matter of routine the ISI ought to have looked at this back in November. Note the dates of the visits. These become important later.

Designated child protection officers

The designated child protection officers and others working in the school have been suitably trained. The Abbey and the parish also each have their own designated child protection officers. However, the various designated officers do not hold formal meetings together.

I'm very suspicious of that phrase "suitably trained". The ISI doesn't say what it means by that. The school's child protection policy requires only "basic child protection training" for the Designated Teachers, but the Ealing Safeguarding Children Board clearly describes in its brochure that the advanced Target Level 3 course is suitable for "Social workers, paediatricians, GPs, youth workers, those working in the early years sector as Designated Safeguarding Professionals, residential staff, midwives, school nurses, health visitors, sexual health staff, designated teachers, probation staff, sports club welfare officers, those working in community play schemes." I've highlighted the categories relevant to the school.

The ISI doesn't tell us what level of training it considered "suitable". That, to put it mildly, is rather regrettable.

Situation at the time of the follow-up inspections

No allegations against current trustees or teachers have been reported. The known cases relate to past events, concerning six previous teachers or trustees. Two involve monks currently living in the monastery under restrictions established by the Diocese of Westminster. The following points refer to each one of the six individuals.

(i) Legal action has been initiated in connection with a previous member of the religious community.

(ii) A monk who had taught in the school a long time ago has recently come under investigation by social services. At the time of the follow-up visits he was living in the monastery under a restrictive covenant barring him from contact with children.

(iii) A similar covenant applies to another monk, also currently residing in the monastery. He had been acquitted of child abuse in 2007.

(iv) A monk, Fr DP, is in custody following his conviction in October 2009 on charges spanning many years. Following a defeat in an earlier civil case, Fr DP was subject to a restrictive covenant, but subsequent to this he engaged in improper conduct with a pupil of the school who was doing work in the monastery. A review of his case was conducted by the safeguarding officer of the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton and an independent social work consultant. The review findings were not available at the time of the ISI inspection in November 2009.

(v) A previous lay teacher, for many years no longer associated with the school, the Abbey and the monastery, was most recently tried and convicted in 2008.

(vi) The case of a monk, now for a long time living abroad, has not been pursued.

In the first paragraph above section above, everything turns on the meaning of "current". If "current" is taken to mean "at the time of the inspection", then that first sentence is strictly true. But if "current" is taken to mean "at the time the allegation was made", then I'm afraid that the sentence is inaccurate. During the past inspection period, two Trustees have resigned as a result of allegations being made against them at the time they were Trustees: Father Stanislaus Hobbs in 2005 and Father Gregory Chillman in 2010. Since there are only six Trustees at any one time, to lose two in the space of five years as a result of child protection concerns is really quite remarkable.

But this is not the end of the matter. As you can see from the report, cases involving six separate monks and teachers have now been disclosed to the ISI. This is a shocking list.

I don't know who (i) is.

Father Gregory Chillman is (ii), though I notice the ISI failed to mention that he was a Trustee at the time the Social Services investigation started. They also fail to note that the investigation was originally started as a result of a complaint from a former pupil to the police.

Father Stanislaus Hobbs is obviosuly (iii), his trial in 2007 received plenty of press coverage at the time.  This however is the first public confirmation that I have seen that, notwithstanding his acquittal, he is regarded as a danger to children and has been placed on restricted ministry.

Father David Pearce is obviously (iv). Again, the ISI has been very coy, and failed to state that "improper conduct" consisted of an indecent assault on a pupil of the school, one of a set of offences that saw him imprisoned for eight years (reduced to five on appeal).

John Maesti is (v). He left the school abruptly in the early 1980s, and went on to obtain a teaching post elsewhere. He has been convicted on three separate occasions in 2003, 2005 and 2008 of abuses against pupils committed at the time he was a teacher at St Benedict's.

And I rather think that (vi) is Abbot Lawrence Soper, who has lived for several years in a monastery in Rome.

And it is worth noting that the papers have recently reported that two former teachers (not named but from the descriptions given obviously identifiable as Pearce and Maestri) have been re-arrested as a result of new complaints, and that the police have requested an 80-year-old monk living abroad to attend a UK police station. I'll leave you to work out who that could possibly be.

So this is not a small matter of past misdemeanours committed a long time ago by people no longer at the school or Abbey. This involves allegations against monks resident at the Abbey or able to visit at any time, being investigated now or very recently.

That covers page 1 of the ISI report. I'll describe page 2 tomorrow. It gets worse.