Correspondence with the Diocese of Westminster

I've been having an exchange of emails with Archbishop Vincent Nichols and with Peter Turner, his Diocesan Safeguarding Advisor. I initially wrote to the Archbishop Requesting an enquiry at Ealing Abbey. The correspondence below starts with his initial reply to me.

from Archbishop Vincent Nichols
to Jonathan West
date 26 April 2010
subject RE: Ealing Abbey and St. Benedicts School

Dear Mr West

Thank you for your email of 22 April.

Thank you for the reports that you give me directly and indirectly about Ealing Abbey.

Clearly I must take these matters to those who have a specific role in safeguarding in the Diocese.

This I will do and I or they will get back to you.

With every good wish,

Yours sincerely

+Vincent Nichols

So far so good. I awaited his further communication. It came a week and a half later.

from Archbishop Vincent Nichols
to Jonathan West
date 7 May 2010
subject RE: Ealing Abbey and St. Benedicts School

Dear Mr West

I write again in response to your email of 22 April.

In it you send to me considerable material concerning St Benedict’s School, Ealing and Ealing Abbey and you request that I institute “as soon as possible a wide ranging enquiry into child sex abuse” there.

The issue is complex as neither Ealing Abbey nor St Benedict’s School fall under the remit of the Diocese.

It is clearly important therefore that you address your comments to the Trustees of St Benedict’s.

You will note that recent enquiries concerning St Benedict’s School and Ealing Abbey have been addressed to those authorities.

I am ready to pass on your comments to me to those proper authorities if you wish me to do so.

With every good wish

+Vincent Nichols

In essence the Archbishop is saying "nothing to do with me". Not good enough.

from Jonathan West
to Archbishop Vincent Nichols
date 8 May 2010
subject Re: Ealing Abbey and St. Benedicts School

Dear Archbishop,

Since I wrote to you, I have learned of another case of abuse at the school, though it is historical and not current. A victim has come forward with an account of abuse by Father Kevin Horsey (now deceased). The sexual abuse was regular and systematic, and committed against the victim and several others during PT lessons circa 1965. According to Horsey's obituary in the Old Priorian newsletter, he was one of the founding monks of the school, and so it is therefore likely that sexual abuse has been going on at the school since its foundation.

If I address my comments to the Trustees of St Benedict's, nothing will be done, because they are implicated in the abuse and its cover-up.

According to the Trust website, http://www.stbenedictsealing.org.uk/st_ben_trust.html, the following people are the Trustees.

Rt Revd Martin Shipperlee OSB - Chairman
Rt Revd Francis Rossiter OSB
Revd Thomas Stapleford OSB
Revd Gregory Chillman OSB
Revd Alexander Bevan OSB
Revd Dominic Taylor OSB

Martin Shipperlee has stated that he became aware of Pearce's activities in 2004 when he was interviewed on the "Sunday" programme on BBC Radio 4 on April 11th. However, the civil trial brought by C in 2006 he gave evidence under oath to the contrary - that although there had been complaints, it had not been thought necessary to take any action against Pearce. I can provide you with a copy of the broadcast recording of that interview if it would assist you. Given this conflicting testimony it is arguable that a case could be brought against him for perjury. At the very least, he has been complicit in covering up the abuse.

Francis Rossiter was Abbot from 1967 to 1991, which encompasses the time when Maestri and Pearce were simultaneously active and Father Anthony Gee (headmaster of the time) was threatening victims into silence. He must have had involvement in the decision to send Maestri on his way with a good reference. This is illegal - even in those days a statutory notification had to be made to the authorities when a teacher resigned suddenly, stating the true reason for the resignation. Rossiter is therefore also complicit in covering up abuse.

I have received a report of abuse committed by Gregory Chillman. I have encouraged the victim to make a statement to the police about this, though I do not know whether he has yet done so. But Chillman has to be regarded as being under suspicion of having committed abuses.

The other three are implicated in cover-up at least to the extent of having agreed to fund David Pearce's defence knowing that he had been placed on restricted ministry.

When I met the Abbot on 11th September last year, he gave me the impression that the Abbey had placed itself under the jurisdiction of the diocese of Westminster for the purpose of safeguarding issues. As I understand it, the Abbot does not respond directly to emails to him concerning past child abuse, but simply passes them unanswered to Peter Turner, the Diocesan Safeguarding Advisor. This impression is certainly reinforced by the Safeguarding page of the Ealing Abbey website, which provides contact details for diocesan safeguarding team.

http://www.ealingabbey.org.uk/01home-1aSafeguarding.htm

Clearly, referring the matter to the Trustees for them voluntarily to take action on an enquiry is useless - they are not going to consent to an investigation of their own potentially illegal activities, it would be like expecting turkeys to vote for Christmas. Therefore if an enquiry is going to happen, it must come from the outside. That is why I wrote to you. If you do not have the authority to initiate an enquiry, then who does?

Be aware that the school's safeguarding procedures are still a sorry mess, and with the continued presence of alleged abusers at the Abbey a new and current case of abuse could potentially appear at any time. If and when that happens, I doubt that the public would take much account of the independent status of Benedictine monasteries when judging whether you fulfilled the promise made in the Statement by the Catholic Bishops of England and Wales.

May I suggest a meeting to discuss these issues and find a way forward? There are some people who share my wish for an enquiry who would want to attend a meeting along with me - parents of past and present pupils, and former pupils who are victims and witnesses of abuse.

Regards
Jonathan West

3 days later I received a reply.

from Archbishop Vincent Nichols
to Jonathan West
date 11 May 2010
subject RE: Ealing Abbey and St. Benedicts School


Dear Mr West

Thank you for your further email of 8 May.

Would you like me to forward your comments to the proper authorities?

With every good wish

+Vincent Nichols

So, he thanked me for my email and totally ignored its contents.

from Jonathan West
to Archbishop Vincent Nichols
date 11 May 2010
subject Re: Ealing Abbey and St. Benedicts School

Dear Archbishop

If you wish to forward my comments to the Trustees (which is who I presume you mean by "the proper authorities") then please do so. If you are willing to add your own recommendation that a wide-ranging enquiry should be set up, I would be most appreciative. I suppose that a request to the Trustees for an enquiry is a necessary step, though it is one I have already made in a meeting I had with the Abbot on 11th September 2009, and my request was ignored.

For this reason and for the reasons I gave in my previous email, I expect that the request for an enquiry will be ignored, or as in the case of the "independent review" will be interpreted in the most narrow possible way so as to restrict the scope of the enquiry to safe areas which do not involve any examination of possible complicity on the part of the Trustees.

I realise that the Trustees have authority over the Abbey and the school, but who has authority within the Church over the Trustees, if you do not? I would be grateful if you could advise me who are those authorities, and I would be grateful if you would also forward my comments to them.

Regards

Jonathan West

No reply.

from Jonathan West
to Archbishop Vincent Nichols
date 31 May 2010
subject Re: Ealing Abbey and St. Benedicts School


Dear Archbishop

I am disappointed not to have received any reply to my email of 11 May.

In it I expressed a willingness for you to forward my concerns to the Trustees, though skepticism as to the good it would do.

Could you advise me whether you have in fact forwarded my concerns to the trustees, and if so, what response you have received?

Also, since you state that Ealing Abbey is not within your remit, are you able to tell me who within the church does have authority over the Abbot and trustees of the Abbey?

Regards
Jonathan West

Obviously this was getting a bit too specific for the Archbishop. The next email was from Peter Turner.

from Peter Turner
to Jonathan West
date 3 June 2010
subject Ealing Abbey


Mr West

I have been asked by Archbishop Nichols to acknowledge receipt of your previous e mails.

He has requested that I contact you and invite you to meet with me so that I can try and address the various issues that you have raised with him.

I would ask that you contact my office so that a suitable appointment could be made for us to meet at some mutually convenient venue.

I will be out of my office tomorrow (Friday 4 June) but you can leave a message or I should be in my office on Monday next.

Regards


Peter W Turner
Safeguarding Advisor
Diocese of Westminster

I phoned him to discuss the issues and wrote an email in confirmation.

from Jonathan West
to Peter Turner
date 7 June 2010
subject Re: Ealing Abbey

Dear Mr Turner,

Following our phone conversations this morning, I confirm that I would like to have a meeting to address my concerns about Ealing Abbey and St Benedict's School.

I do not think a private meeting between the two of us will achieve anything worthwhile. I am in touch with a significant number of people who share my concerns. Therefore I propose that we hold a meeting to which some of these can come, and to which you invite Abbot Martin Shipperlee, Prior Francis Rossiter and headmaster Mr Christoper Cleugh also to attend. This would be in accordance with the Archbishop's suggestion that my concerns be addressed towards the Trustees. I understand that you cannot do more than request that they attend, and that you cannot compel their attendance if they refuse.

I would also appreciate it if Archbishop Vincent Nichols were also able to attend for at least part of the meeting, so that it can be made clear to all parties that this matter falls within the scope of the recent statement by the Catholic Bishops on child protection, particularly the paragraph on transparency which I quoted in my initial email to the Archbishop. If there are any other church officials who you think should attend, or if Abbot Martin wishes to have other Trustees also attend, I have no objection to that.

We have provisionally arranged for the meeting to be held on the afternoon of 29th June. Some people may have to travel a considerable distance to attend, so I suggest that the meeting is held at the diocesan offices in Westminster, that being a convenient central location. If you could confirm the date, time and location as soon as possible, this would make it much easier for people to make travel plans.

Nearer the time, I shall forward an agenda to you covering the issues we wish to address.

I also asked you who within the church has authority over the Abbot, if the Archbishop does not. I would be grateful if you would research this matter and raise it with the Archbishop so that a definitive answer is available prior to the meeting. If the Abbot is not willing voluntarily to take whatever measures are thought to be necessary, then we need to know to what higher authority within the church the matter should be addressed.

We discussed the Abbot General of the English Benedictine Congregation. It appears that we both share the impression that he does not have authority over individual Benedictine houses, but is more a representative of the EBC to the outside world. It would be helpful if you could check this and confirm whether this is so.

We discussed whether the Abbey had put itself under the authority of the diocese for the purpose of child protection issues, given that the diocesan child protection team was listed on the Abbey website. As I understand it, you as diocesan safeguarding advisor cannot compel any action on the Abbot but only make recommendations to the Abbey regarding child protection issues, and that the Abbot is not formally obliged to act on your recommendation, no matter how unwise you might consider such inaction to be. Is my understanding correct on this point?

We discussed the NCSC and the CSAS. I said that we had raised concerns with them, but that we had recently been advised that they had tipped the issue back into your lap, and that they therefore are not in a position to commission an investigation over the head of the Abbot. Again, please confirm whether this is your understanding also.

We also discussed the Charity Commission. They are not relevant to my question for two reasons. First, I wish to know the line of authority specifically within the Church, and the Charity Commission is a branch of government not of the church. Second, in any case, the Charity Commission is not the correct secular organisation to whom concerns should be put. I have been in touch with the Charity Commission, and they have advised me that they are keeping a watch on the situation, but that they hold no investigating brief in respect of child protection issues. Their supervisory role is restricted to ensuring that charitable funds are properly used for charitable purposes.

I asked who has the authority to order a Visitation in the event that one was thought necessary - for instance if the Abbot were to refuse voluntarily to mount an investigation, and that you as diocesan safeguarding advisor felt that the Abbot was being unreasonable. Could you find out who has that authority? If it is not the Archbishop, the Abbot General or the NCSC, is there any source of authority within the church lower than the Pope himself who can act?

Regards
Jonathan West

No reply for a week.

from Jonathan West
to Peter Turner
date 15 June 2010
subject Re: Ealing Abbey

Dear Mr Turner

Could you please let me know whether you have been able to contact the Abbot, Prior and Headmaster, and whether they will be attending the meeting we have provisionally arranged for the afternoon of 29th June?

The reason I need to know as soon as possible is that some of those who wish to accompany me (including victims of abuse at the school) will be travelling some considerable distance to attend, including in at least one case travelling from abroad. We therefore need to have confirmation of the meeting so that they can make their travel plans.

The areas that we wish to address are as follows:

1. Historical cases of abuse by Pearce, Maestri and others, and the Abbey's actions in response.

2. The independent review publicly promised by the Abbot on the day Pearce was sentenced.

3. The school's current child protection policy, and the failings thereof.

You will see from these items why all the attendance of all three people I have requested is necessary. I think that to discuss item 1 adequately, both the Abbot and the Prior need to be present, since Father Francis was Abbot at the time John Maestri was a teacher at the school and will therefore have a memory of those events.

The Abbot is necessary for item 2 since only he can address details such as the decision process which led to the selection of the terms of reference for the independent review.

The Abbot and Headmaster are both needed for item 3, since the Abbot has approved the child protection procedures and the Headmaster is responsible to all aspects of the day-to-day running of the school, including the implementation of the child protection policy.

Regards
Jonathan West

This did finally elicit a reply.

from Peter Turner
to Jonathan West
date 15 June 2010
subject RE: Ealing Abbey


Mr West

I am sorry I have not got back sooner, I have been out of the office and will be so until Friday.

However, I am meeting with Abbot Martin on Thursday and will seek his answer then and let you know.

Peter W Turner

I phoned him on the Friday after the meeting to find out what the Abbot's response was. He told me and confirmed it an email.

from Peter Turner
to Jonathan West
date 18 June 2010
subject RE: Ealing Abbey


Mr West

I apologise for having to curtail our conversation earlier.

As I mentioned during our conversation the Abbot, Fr Rossiter & the Head teacher feel that in the circumstances it would be inappropriate to attend the meeting.

If you have knowledge of any further victims, these should be advised to contact the Statutory Agencies to report there concerns and the matter would then be dealt with. However, I am willing to assist in this process, but would only wish to see each victim alone in the first instance in order that no allegation could be later aired in any court proceedings of collusion I would urge you to bear this in mind in any further dealings with possible victims.

In view of our conversation regarding the proposed meeting, I will contact the Archbishop with your request to meet with him.

To answer you earlier questions:

1. Pearce remain in prison and Maestri has no contact with the school, as a result of earlier convictions.

2. The review has been published, as far as confidentiality permits.

3. The schools current child protection policy has been approved by the Independent Schools inspection team.

Please let me know at your earliest convenience, if you still wish to attend the meeting on the 29 June.


Peter W Turner

This was starting to get ridiculous.

from Jonathan West
to Peter Turner
date 22 June 2010
subject Re: Ealing Abbey

Dear Mr Turner

To confirm our phone conversation yesterday, I understand that the 3 points in your email were provided to you by the Abbot with the assistance of his press officer.

Point 1 is not relevant to anything we wish to discuss, since we wish to discuss what child protection measures were taken at the time Pearce and Maestri were at the school.

Point 2 is not true. The review has not been published. What has been published is a summary of it prepared by Father Peter Burns. The PDF file shows "Peter B" as the author in the document properties. In any case, the point is irrelevant since we wish to discuss matters surrounding it, such as the choice of the terms of reference.

Point 3 is also not true. Over the last week, I have been in contact with the ISI and the DfE. The latter in particular have been most insistent in their assurance that the ISI is still working with the school to bring its child protection policies "up to requirements" and that the May 24 update currently published on the school website is not the outcome of that work.

You also indicated that the Abbot believes his attendance to be inappropriate because further new allegations of abuse may be made. That is not the intended purpose of the meeting, I wish to discuss the response of the Abbey and the school to abuse which has happened in the past, and the school's current policies and procedures to prevent abuse in future. No victim will be making new statements concerning abuse at this meeting.

The Abbot's reason for believing his attendance to be inappropriate is therefore not applicable. I therefore request that you repeat your invitation to the Abbot, Prior and Headmaster to attend. Given that some of my party will be travelling from abroad, time is now of the essence and I request that you obtain a response somewhat more quickly than the 2 weeks the previous rejection took. However, if it takes longer to obtain a response from the Abbot, I propose that the meeting be postponed by a week in order to give people the opportunity to make travel plans.

In addition, I request that you provide an answer to the question I put in my earlier email - within the Catholic Church, who has authority over the Abbot?

By the way (although we did not touch on this in the phone call) I have been approached privately by many victims of abuse at Ealing Abbey and St. Benedict's School. I always encourage them to come forward and make a statement to the police, and I provide contact details for the local Child Abuse Investigation Team. The correspondence with each victim is kept confidential from the rest, so no victim knows details of any other victim who has contacted me privately, nor of the abuse suffered by any other victim. Unless somebody has made a public comment on the blog about abuse by a particular monk or teacher, I do not even indicate to a victim whether anybody else has come forward with accounts of abuse by the same person.

Regards
Jonathan West

I was quite certain that the Abbot would again refuse to meet. But I was curious to know what excuse he would choose this time. It wasn't long coming.

from Peter Turner
to Jonathan West
date 24 June 2010
subject Ealing Abbey

Mr West

I have now heard from Abbot Martin and he does not wish to attend the proposed meeting on Tuesday next.

He is willing to meet any victims, either individually or as a group. (Albeit, it would of course be better for him to see any victims alone, in order not to compromise any future criminal proceedings). I would also be willing to attend such a meeting with the Abbot.

You asked me to ascertain who is responsible for overseeing the Abbot and I have tried to explain below.

The Abbot President (Abbot Robert Yeo) [sic] has the duty to advise and warn, but cannot directly intervene in the life of a united Community.

The local bishops have an interest but like the President have no power to directly intervene

Ultimately there is recourse to the Holy See. This could be done via the Apostolic Nuncio, but he’s very sick, so you would have to approach the Congregation for Institutes of Religious Life and Societies of Apostolic Life in Rome. They could ultimately invoke an Apostolic Visitation, but they’d probably go first to the Abbot President

The Abbot President of the English Benedictine Congregation
Abbot Richard Yeo OSB
Downside Abbey
Stratton-on-the-Fosse
Bath BA3 4RH

Peter W Turner
Safeguarding Advisor
Diocese of Westminster

This is quite extraordinary. First is the matter of the Abbot's excuse. Initially he had claimed that it would be inappropriate to meet me because there would be victims present. Now he is happy to meet victims so long as I am not present!

But much more important is that there is nobody within the Catholic Church in England and Wales who has any authority over the Abbot. If there is any suspicion of wrongdoing, then you have to go to Rome to ask for something to be done about it. The same of course applies to all the other Benedictine monasteries and convents in Britain (Ampleforth, Belmont, Buckfast, Colwich, Curzon Park, Downside, Portsmouth, Stanbrook, and Worth). And I would expect that the same applies to the Carthusians, the Cistercians, Carmelites, Poor Clares and so on.

Although geographically they are part of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, organisationally they are not part of the Catholic Church of England and Wales, and the writ of the Bishops and of Archbishop Vincent Nichols does not run there. So much for Archbishop Vincent Nichols' promise of transparency. If he is genuinely unable to do anything about Ealing Abbey or the other schools run by religious orders (some of which have had child abuse problems as well), then he shouldn't have been making the promise of transparency in the first place. But if the promise of transparency does apply to the religious orders, then perhaps they should have been included in the drafting process and persuaded to sign up to the Statement.

But first things first. I wrote to the Archbishop, forwarding the correspondence with Peter Turner, and saying that I had done what he suggested in raising the matter with the Trustees, and that they take no notice of my written concerns and refuse to meet me in person. What does he suggest next?

from Jonathan West
to Archbishop Vincent Nichols
cc Peter Turner
date 24 June 2010
subject Fwd: Ealing Abbey

Dear Archbishop

As you be able to see from the email below from Peter Turner, the Abbot is not prepared to meet me to discuss my concerns. Initially the reason given by the Abbot to Mr. Turner was that it would be inappropriate for him to be present in a meeting with victims who might be recounting experiences of abuse.

On being told this by Mr Turner, I explained to him that although a number of old boys of the school (including some victims) wished to accompany me to the meeting, our intention was to discuss safeguarding policies and procedures at the Abbey and St. Benedict's. This was therefore not a reason to avoid attending the meeting.

Now, as you can see from Mr Turner's email below, it seems that meetings of the Abbot with victims individually or collectively are perfectly OK, so long as I am not present. This appears to be a complete about-face compared to the reason given previously. I cannot help but think that any excuse will do so long as it serves to avoid a meeting with me.

The school has recently updated its child protection policy (the new version is dated May 24 of this year)
http://www.stbenedicts.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/Child-Protection-and-Safeguarding-Policy-2010-24th-May-Final.pdf

However, the few changes have been made since the September 2009 version have done nothing to address my concerns, which I have expressed both in emails to the Abbot and Headmaster and publicly.

Therefore since it is clear that the Abbot takes no account of concerns raised in writing and refuses to meet with me, I have now exhausted all means of raising the matter with the Trustees as you suggested in your earlier email.

You should also note that the original response from the Abbot as forwarded by Mr. Turner (I have included the relevant emails below) contains material untruths.

Specifically, the Abbot's statement that the "Independent Review" has been published is not true. What was published is a summary probably prepared by Fr Peter Burns.

Also, the Abbot's statement that the school's current child protection policy has been approved by the Independent Schools Inspectorate is also untrue. I have been in communication both with Mr. Durell Barnes, Director of Communication of the ISI, and with Ms. Georgina Carney, of the Independent Education & Boarding Schools Team at the Department for Education. I have been categorically assured that work to bring the school's safeguarding policy "up to requirements" (Ms. Carney's words) is ongoing and that the May 2010 version of the school's child protection policy is not the outcome of that work.

I request that you intervene in this matter, making a personal request to the Abbot to meet with us both, so that my concerns can be properly addressed.

Please would you telephone me so that we can discuss the matter.

Yours sincerely


Jonathan West

So far I have had no reply from the Archbishop. But a few days later, I received this laughably irrelevant email from Peter Turner.

from Peter Turner
to Jonathan West
date 28 June 2010 08:07
subject RE: Ealing Abbey


Mr West

Can you please confirm whether you will be attending the meeting at Vaughan House tomorrow?

Peter

I replied as follows.

from Jonathan West
to Peter Turner
date 28 June 2010 09:24
subject Re: Ealing Abbey

Since the Abbot will not be attending, and I have received no reply to my last email to the Archbishop, I see no point at this time in having a meeting. Perhaps you could ask the Archbishop to telephone me to advise what (if anything) he proposes to do.

Regards
Jonathan West

The next email was even more ridiculous.

from Peter Turner
to Jonathan West
date 28 June 2010 09:35
subject RE: Ealing Abbey


Mr West

Many thanks for letting me know that you will not be attending tomorrow.

I will certainly inform the Archbishop of this and your request for him to contact you.

Can I again please impress upon you that, should any victims become known to you that you ask them to contact the Police or Social Service’s. I am always available to assist them should they wish to speak to me, in the first instance.


Peter W Turner

I'm coming to the conclusion that he doesn't even read my emails properly. I've already told him that I encourage any victims who contact me to make a statement to the police.

from Jonathan West
to Peter Turner
date 28 June 2010 10:21
subject Re: Ealing Abbey


Dear Mr Turner

I have already advised you that I have been contacted by several victims of various monks and teachers at St. Benedicts. I always encourage them to come forward and make a statement to the police, no matter how long ago the abuse occurred, and no matter whether the perpetrator is still alive. A number of victims who first contacted me have gone on to make a statement to the police, and I understand that one or more such complaints led to the arrest of Father Gregory Chillman earlier this year.

I leave it to the police to investigate to see whether any criminal prosecutions can be brought as a result. I have been in touch with DS Gareth Morgan, to ensure that my approach to this will assist rather than impede any criminal investigations carried out by the police.

My concern is more about the culture of cover-up at the Abbey, and the way in which the school's child protection procedures are written so as to enable the school to avoid reporting allegations and suspicions of abuse, and to classify various kinds of sexual contact as not being incidents of abuse. This the complete opposite of the "transparency" promised by the Archbishop and his colleagues in the Statement from the Catholic Bishops of England and Wales a month or two ago. Could I ask whether you have actually read the school's child protection policy, whether you consider it a document which is appropriate to its purpose, whether you have requested changes, and whether those changes have been implemented?

I added in at this point a further account of abuse that had recently been brought to my attention, where I had been requested to bring the matter to the attention of the relevant authorities. It is not appropriate for me to publish the details at this time.

I closed with the following:

Finally, you should be aware that the Abbot's refusal to meet has caused great anger amongst those who intended accompanying me to the meeting and the others supporting them - including parents, old boys, victims and members of victims' families.

Regards
Jonathan West

So far, no response to this last email.

So, here is the situation. The Abbot is avoiding meeting me. He doesn't reply to emails. His excuses for not meeting me quite frankly contain lies, and not even very subtle ones. It would seem that he would prefer to be seen to be a liar than have to spend any time in the same room as me.

The Archbishop is not formally able to force the Abbot to do anything he doesn't want to do, and has not given any indication of a willingness to use informal influence to persuade the Abbot to make changes.

The School has recently updated its child protection policies, but they remain as weak as ever and bound about by caveats and matters of subjective judgement, even down to the very definition of "sexual abuse" which is written in a way as to depend on an opinion on the part of the school as to whether a child understands what is being done to him. In essence, the school's safeguarding policy is a paedophile's charter.

The Abbey itself has no safeguarding procedures. At least, it has no procedures which it either publishes or refers to on its website. It has a Safeguarding Statement, which is an expression of intent with no procedures. The Safeguarding Statement is followed by contact details firstly of the diocesan safeguarding team and then afterwards of the Parish Safeguarding Representatives, but without giving any clue as to what their duties are or whether allegations or suspicions of abuse should be raised with them. And it contains a link to the recommendations and procedures of the Catholic Safeguarding Advisory Service, but I notice that there is nothing on the Abbey website which says that the Abbey is actually following those procedures.

Father David Pearce's appeal against sentence

Yesterday, there was a hearing of Father David Pearce's appeal against his 8-year sentence for sexual and indecent assaults against pupils of St. Benedict's School. On appeal, Sir Christopher Holland sitting with Mr Justice David Clarke has reduced Pearce's sentence from 8 years to 5 years in prison. Given that half the sentence is automatically suspended, that means Pearce will probably serve 2 1/2 years, and will therefore leave prison about 2 years from now.

I'm not overly surprised at the reduction in sentence - my own guess at the probable sentence after hearing the barristers' submissions at Pearce's sentencing hearing in October was 5 years, and so I was a little surprised when the judge came back with 8 years. But I figured that he knew more about the sentencing guidelines than I did.

But I am very concerned about Sir Christopher Holland's comments, as reported in The Times today. In particular, I'm incensed about his comment that the sentencing judge was wrong to elevate the breach of trust committed by Pearce because he was a teacher “to the level of a crime”.

The damage done to children by paedophile abusers is caused precisely by this breach of trust, and the damage done is far more dependent on the degree of the breach of trust than it is on the seriousness of the physical assault. Pearce had worked himself into a position where he was greatly trusted by the school and the community, through "the great deal of good work this man has done over a 30-year period" which Sir Christopher has referred to. Pearce was a priest, a teacher, a headmaster, a pillar of the local community, and he used and abused that trust in order to gain access to and assault his victims. It was only because he was trusted that he was able to get away with it for so long. The trust should not be regarded as a mitigating factor if it was this trust that was deliberately built up primarily for the purpose of being able to abuse children.

I've had an email today from one of the former pupils at the school. He expresses his disgust far more eloquently than I could.

"Evil Priest Abused Boys In Care Home" sells tabloids. "Saucy Monks Touched Up Posh Boys" doesn't. This view permeates British society from the bottom upwards, as Judge Holland's disturbing but all too predictable remarks show us. Sorry to be so blunt but my views are based on personal experience of the few occasions in the past when I have tried to talk about what happened to me before St Benedict's and what happened to me at St Benedict's.

The first man who groomed and abused me between the ages of eleven and fourteen (before I came to St. Benedict's) was into photography, which is how the police were able to establish that he had abused more than fifty boys in a four year period. I later heard that he got seven years, reduced on appeal and was out and off to Amsterdam in two years, plus time served on remand. He was a teacher and, like Pearce, a youthful, blond thirtysomething ex-army officer. He was at least more charming than Pearce.

I was not abused at St Benedict's because I refused to be. I also tried to protect two friends of mine from prep school who went there. I failed to protect them and, somewhere deep inside me, I carried that sense of guilt for a long time. Pearce and Soper completely ruined one of them and did the other some serious damage. Neither has been seen by any of our contemporaries to this day. We believed that one of them had killed himself but recent evidence has emerged to the contrary.

I tried to stand up against Pearce, Soper and the whole rotten shower of moral bankrupts in charge of that school in the 1970s. I found myself labelled as a troublemaker and, more seriously, a thief. I believe that Pearce and one of "his boys" set me up for this charge. The only man who defended me was Dom Edmund Flood, a terrifying-looking but deeply good man, who I heard was later exiled to some shithole in Africa for "rocking the boat" at the Abbey.

If anyone knows more about Flood's fate, I'd be grateful for information because I remember him with gratitude for his efforts. But they were futile because I was ultimately expelled or, to be more precise, my parents were informed that I needn't come back for the Lower Sixth in the autumn of 1977.

That was my education down the toilet. I drifted into some fairly heavy duty delinquency before the Parachute Regiment instilled some self-discipline in me. I tried to pick the education up as a mature student at London University, having lied about O and A levels to get in, but only lasted two years because I still had such a problem with educational authorities...plus the head of the course was a defrocked Spanish priest. Still, I learned to read and write again, which was more useful than a degree.

I have a very good life now but it has taken a long time to be able to confront some of the ghosts and the demons. Jonathan's website helped me more than he can possibly imagine and it has also helped others. What went on at St Benedict's under the auspices of Ealing Abbey for decades turns out to have been far, far worse than I think even those of us who encountered it first hand could have imagined.

It is truly, abjectly appalling. However, I have learned that there is nothing shameful about having been a victim. I have also learned to be very angry with the men who did this to me, as opposed to tending to protect them or minimise what they did when I was younger. I am going to write an article, which will be very hard to write, in the hope that The Times, as a first choice, given their support in this case, might run it and that it might help others to free themselves from the past and come forward.

Hopefully, it might also show up the grim absurdity of the sort of views expressed by Judge Holland. It is hard not to be bitter but very important to fight such sentiments because if you let them take over, then you are allowing the Pearces of this world their sordid victories. After all, it was never about sex, as dangerous fools like Holland seem to think, but about power, the power wielded by inadequate men over those least able to defend themselves.

I have just two things to add. First, if the article mentioned just above isn't taken up by the Times or any other paper or magazine, I would consider it an honour to host it here.

My other point is that if you are a victim of abuse by Pearce, and have not yet come forward to the police, it is not too late to do so. I have been assured by the police that they will take seriously any further reports of abuse by Pearce or anybody else at St. Benedict's School, and if the evidence warrants it, they will pass the cases to the CPS for further prosecutions. John Maestri has been before the courts on three occasions relating to his abuses of children at St. Benedict's School, so the fact that Pearce has been convicted once does not mean that no further prosecutions can proceed. But unless you come forward, the police have no evidence to work with.

If you would like help getting in touch with the correct people at the police, email me at jonathanwest22@googlemail.com. I will treat your email in strictest confidence for as long as you want it to be so.

The Abbot's letter to parents

Abbot Martin Shipperlee has written a new letter to all parents about Father David Pearce and the recent press comment.

Dear Parents,

As I am sure you are aware, there has been considerable comment in the press about Fr David Pearce, a member of the monastic community who last October pleaded guilty to sexual abuse of children.

It will come as no surprise to you that a number of statements in the newspaper articles were incorrect;

I notice that the Abbot has been carefully unspecific about precisely which statements were incorrect. I would welcome enlightenment on what he thinks are the inaccurate bits. I suspect I might have to wait quite a while.

however, I would like to focus on one thing that was said. The question was asked, ‘Did they do enough?’ and the answer to that is clear. No, with the benefit of hindsight in respect of the Monastery we clearly didn’t do enough; and consequently Fr David was able to commit a further offence. All this is a matter of huge regret and shame and I constantly reiterate my apologies to all those hurt by this.

This is of a piece with all the rest of the Abbot's statements. He is relentlessly concentrating on Pearce's last victim, in the hope that we will not ask any questions about the time before Pearce was placed on restricted ministry.

No doubt you will be aware of the recent inspection report on St Benedict’s which judged Child Protection to be good and overall pastoral care to be outstanding.

I have indeed seen that report. It wasn't merely glowing, it was positively incandescent. It was so good that it could have been written by the school itself as advertising material. No wonder links to the two reports (for the junior and senior schools) are prominently displayed on the home page of the school website.

Given what has happened at the school in recent years, it was far too good as to be remotely believable. So I made some enquiries with the Independent Schools Inspectorate. The ISI has been investigating, and as a result of their investigations, the November 2009 report has been withdrawn from the ISI website. The only report remaining there is the report from the previous inspection in January 2004. The ISI investigations are ongoing. I expect that we will hear more from them in due course.

However as a result of issues relating to Fr David we have reviewed all our procedures and policies for Safeguarding of the Vulnerable, as has been noted by the Charity Commission.

This is not quite accurate. The Charity Commission conducted two Statutory Enquiries, which were combined into a single report published after Pearce was sentenced. In the section of the report describing the first enquiry, the Charity Commission stated:

17. The Commission obtained copies of the Charity’s child protection policies and procedures. The Charity was able to demonstrate that these policies had been reviewed by the appropriate authorities and that these were adequate.

So, this isn't a review carried out by the school, the Charity Commission is instead noting that the school's existing policies had been reviewed by "the appropriate authorities". Not quite the same thing. And clearly they weren't in fact adequate, because Pearce was continuing to abuse. The second Statutory Enquiry was started as a result of the Abbey making a Serious Incident Report on Pearce's arrest. In the part of the report concerned with the second enquiry, the Commission stated:

54. Following the arrest in January 2008 the trustees took positive steps to protect the reputation of the Charity and continue to do so – the trustees have confirmed publicly that an independent review will be carried out to ensure that this situation can not reoccur.

So, the Charity Commission has noted that a review has been promised, but not actually conducted. Now, the Commission published their report on 15 December 2009, and the Abbot publicly promised this review in a letter to parents on October 2nd, the day Pearce was sentenced.

The latest version of the School's Child Protection and Safeguarding Policy is dated 1st September 2009. So it cannot have been modified as a result of the review promised by the Abbot.

But look at the following paragraph from the report of the ISI's inspection carried out on 9-12 November 2009.

"4.4 The trustees and advisers are fully aware of, and diligent in discharging, their responsibilities for the welfare, health and safety of pupils, including taking proper steps to review and evaluate the effectiveness of their child protection policies and procedures. A serious recent incident involving a member of the monastic community caused the trustees to request an independent review of the measures taken to minimize risk. The advice received from the independent experts has been fully implemented." (my emphasis)

There are a number of problems with this statement. First of course is that Pearce's 36-year paedophile career has been compressed into "a serious recent incident", and that Maestri's convictions haven't been mentioned at all.

The school has a statutory obligation to Notify such incidents to the DCSF (Department for Children Schools and Families) when they come to light, irrespective of how long ago the event occurred. The following events all come within the category of Notifiable incidents.

1. The trial and conviction in 2005 of John Maestri.
2. The civil case brought by a "C" in 2006 against Pearce and the school.
3. The trial in 2007 of Father Stanislaus Hobbs.
4. During the trial of Fr Hobbs, evidence was given of a separate sexual assault on the same boy by Fr Hobbs during a school trip to Italy. Because the event occurred outside the UK, it cannot be prosecuted here, but during police questioning, a record of which was given in evidence at the trial, Fr Hobbs accepted that the incident had occurred as described.
5. Another trial and conviction of John Maestri in 2008/9.
6. The trial and conviction of Father David Pearce in 2009.

In addition, Maestri's first 2003 conviction should have been mentioned in the ISI's January 2004 report of St Benedict's School. I have been enquiring of the ISI and the DCSF as to whether these Notifications were in fact made by the school, and whether they were passed by DCSF to ISI.

The second point is the matter of the independent review. The school's Child Protection policy is dated 1st September 2009. When I had a meeting with the Abbot on 11th September, I suggested that an independent review should be carried out. From his response, it was perfectly clear that no such review had yet been conducted, and he was not prepared to make an immediate promise that he would hold one.

A review was promised in the Abbot's letter to parents of 2nd October, the day Father David Pearce was sentenced.

The Charity Commission Report published on 15th December 2009 notes that "the trustees have confirmed publicly that an independent review will be carried out" and that "The Commission has requested a copy of the independent review". So clearly, it wasn't available by then.

I have had an exchange of emails on this subject with Peter Turner, the Diocesan Safeguarding Advisor, and on 15th February 2010 he wrote to me saying "A Review was commissioned by Abbot Martin, but this is still to report back with the findings. It is intended that within the bounds of confidentiality the report will be published."

A Summary Note of the Independent Review finally appeared on the Abbey website (with links from both the school and Abbey sites) on or around 18th March. It did not address the school's procedures at all, only those of the Abbey and Parish. It did not address Father David Pearce's activities in the school, merely in the monastery. It did not address the great majority of the time he was abusing children, but concentrated solely on the failure to properly supervise him once he had been placed on a restricted ministry.

The school's child protection policy is dated 1st September 2009, before the review was even promised, and yet the ISI's 9-12 November 2009 inspection report states that the review has been carried out and its recommendations have been acted on! The dates just don't fit.

I sent emails to both the Abbot and the Headmaster asking them to describe the evidence provided to the ISI on which this statement in the report was based. Neither has replied to me on this point. The ISI is investigating.

Will all this be good enough? Only if it is accompanied by honesty about the past and a rigorous questioning of the application of our policies and procedures in the present. We remain committed to offering to all our pupils a happy, purposeful and safe environment in which to learn. We will be constantly reviewing our safeguarding procedures to ensure that this is the case.

I have taken a detailed look at the the school's child protection policy, and I'm not impressed by it. I have brought this to the Abbot's attention, and he has not replied to me. I have brought it to the headmaster's attention and he has replied only that the policies will be reviewed again later in the academic year. They don't seem to be all that welcoming of the questions that I have raised.

I also need your support to help keep St Benedict’s a safe place for children. If you have any concerns about the safety of children, please inform the Dedicated Teacher for Child Protection. There are contact details for this teacher and relevant agencies within the Child Protection and Safeguarding Policy which can be found on the school website. No concern should go unreported.

As I said, I have reported my concerns. The Abbot doesn't seem to be in much of a hurry to do anything about them. This does not sound to me much like the "honesty about the past and a rigorous questioning of the application of our policies and procedures in the present" which the Abbot promised in his letter.

Pearce was convicted of a number of sexual and indecent assaults over a 36-year period, starting in 1972. There have been quite a few additional accounts of abuse by Pearce in comments here on this blog. It is likely that only a small proportion of the victims have come across this blog, and probably only a relatively small proportion of them will have felt able to post an account here. There are undoubtedly many more victims than we know of.

Pearce has to be described as an habitual paedophile abuser. I would be surprised if it turned out that he has abused fewer than three boys a year on average during his time at the Abbey. He first arrived at the Abbey as a Novice in 1969, and left on his arrest in January 2008 that means that a conservative estimate of the number of his victims is over a hundred.

In my meeting with the Abbot, I requested that he set up an independent review that went back 40 years and tried to uncover the full extent of the problem, so that comfort could be provided to as many victims as possible. Instead, he commissioned a review whose scope was restricted solely to the handling of the last 18 months or so of Pearce's residence in the Abbey, the management of his restricted ministry, and Pearce's abuse of just one victim.

And of course, Pearce was not the only abuser in the school. John Maestri was at the school for something like 12 years. Put him down for 3 a year as well. Allegations have been made against others as well.

We have a situation where two now-convicted paedophiles were able to operate over decades before being caught. Maestri went on to teach elsewhere, and Pearce was long retired from teaching duties before his abuses first came to light as a result of C's civil suit. So the school's policies failed entirely to put a stop to abuse by these two.

The school's child protection policy is a sorry mess, and in my view quite unfit for purpose. The Abbot and headmaster have ignored my concerns, the recent "independent review" did not address the school at all, and the Abbot is being at best somewhat misleading on the subject. Additional abuse could be going on at the school today, and the procedures cannot be relied on to detect this and put an end to it.

Allegations have been made against monks still resident at the Abbey, and Abbot Martin has shown that he is unable effectively to supervise monks who are a danger to children.

In the circumstances, I have severe concerns about the safety of children at the school.

Letter to the Catholic Herald

The Catholic Herald last week had as its lead story Archbishop Nichols takes legal advice over newspaper's 'unwarranted slur'.

I wrote a Letter to the Editor pointing out that abuse at St. Benedict's School has been going on for decades, and that it is a strange sense of priorities which has Archbishop Vincent Nichols asking for legal advice as to whether he has been defamed by the Times when most of the duration of Father David Pearce's paedophile career at Ealing Abbey has not been the subject of any review or investigation by the church.

Of course, the Catholic Herald didn't publish the letter!

Here is the letter in full.

=====================

Sir - With regard to the crimes committed by Father David Pearce at St. Benedict's School and Ealing Abbey, most of the press attention has concentrated on the fact that Pearce managed to assault his last victim while on a restricted ministry. Far more important is that Pearce was able to sexually abuse pupils at the school unhindered during the previous 35 years. Pearce pleaded guilty in 2009 to sexual and indecent assaults on a range of dates from 1972 to 2007. Pearce's nickname "Gay Dave" was widely known amongst the pupils over several decades, as was the danger of being alone in a room with him. It is inconceivable that the adults running the school never learned anything of this.

Another former teacher, John Maestri, has also been convicted three times of sexual assaults on boys at the school. He was sentenced on the first of those occasions to 2½ years in prison, and has been placed on the Sex Offenders Register for an indefinite period. It would appear that the child protection procedures at the school entirely failed to pick up on Maestri, since the convictions occurred some 20 years after he left the school.

Therefore, this is a far greater issue than merely a failure to supervise Pearce properly once he had been placed on a restricted ministry. We have a situation where two now-convicted paedophiles were able to operate at the school over a period of decades. So far, this wider failure appears not to have been investigated at all, and so it is very unlikely that any lessons have yet been learned from these tragic events. In the circumstances, it is entirely possible that abuses by others could also have occurred at the school so far undetected, and that further abuses could still happen there in the future.

On the "Sunday" programme on BBC R4 on April 11th, Abbot Martin Shipperlee suggested that everything had been done correctly according to the guidelines, while Eileen Shearer (COPCA's first director) said that "the system is only as good as those who operate it", perhaps implicitly suggesting that the Abbot was incompetent in implementing the guidelines. Since Pearce was able to continue abusing, either the guidelines weren't adequate, or they weren't correctly followed, or both.

Even today, the school's current published child protection procedures are well short of the CSAS recommendations. For instance, reporting of allegations is only carried out under "proper circumstances", a phrase left undefined and therefore in effect left to the unlimited discretion of the school, and even the definition of "sexual abuse" depends on a subjective assessment of the extent to which the child is aware of the nature of the activities.

It is urgently necessary that a detailed investigation be conducted to see what can be learned from this case over its whole duration of more than 30 years, to reduce the chance of such failures happening again either at St. Benedict's School or elsewhere. In addition, the school's child protection procedures need to be externally reviewed and updated to come into line with best practice, including the mandatory reporting of all allegations and suspicions of abuse to the Local Authority Designated Officer, who then has the responsibility for deciding whether the matter requires further investigation.

It would seem to me that the placing of a priest on restricted ministry in response to child abuse allegations is hardly an everyday occurrence, and I find it extraordinary that the board of COPCA would not be informed when such an event occurs. I also find it extraordinary that COPCA would not also get directly involved in reviewing the arrangements for supervising a priest on restricted ministry when he continues to live next door to a school! However, accepting Archbishop Vincent Nichols' assurance that this is so, this is another area which the review should examine, to see whether COPCA's successor organisations NCSC and CSAS should have a coordinating role in supervising restricted ministries and other similar arrangements, to ensure that best practice in safeguarding is implemented across the country.

Since the events occurred during Archbishop Vincent Nichols' time as chairman of COPCA, this is a failure that occurred on his watch, even accepting that he had no personal involvement in the case. It seems to be a strange sense of priorities for effort to be expended on considering whether the Archbishop has been defamed by The Times while the underlying issues of the case remain uninvestigated. He can hardly be unaware of the extent of the failures now, so there really is no excuse for a full investigation not to be undertaken immediately.

Talking to victims of sexual abuse

A commenter on my previous article has made the following point.

If you have strong evidence that several monks have been involved in abuse, you should pass this to police without delay. Also, if you have received allegations, you must encourage those concerned to go to police. You are in danger of prejudicing prosecution if you carry out an unofficial investigation.

If you have evidence that there are 'hundreds of abuse victims' at St Benedicts' you should contact the police immediately.

It's a serious question and it deserves a serious answer.

Of course, I have spoken to the police. I have told them that from time to time I receive emails from victims talking about their abuse. The detective I spoke to was happy with the approach that I take, which is to provide such support and encouragement as I can to persuade the victim to come forward voluntarily to make a statement, but not to forward correspondence without permission.

As I understand it, if the victim is unwilling to make a statement to police and is unprepared ultimately to speak in court, then any email sent privately to me by a victim is useless for the purpose of a prosecution.

So, I treat correspondence as confidential unless and until the victim is prepared either for me to contact somebody on his behalf or to make that contact himself.

It is not easy for victims to come forward. There is a considerable overhang of guilt and shame involved, which remains even though the adult rational part of their mind recognises that there is nothing for them to feel guilty about. That is why victims can often take 30 years or more to summon the courage to come forward. When dealing with child sex abuse and its effects, all ideas of what we think of as logical thought-processes count for very little, and the guilt doesn't go away just because the rational part of your mind decides that it should. This is because the experiences occurred before your adult rational mind was fully formed.

The victims have an experience of the adult world betraying their trust. I have no moral right to betray that trust all over again.

By the way, I'm not carrying out my own investigation. I can't barge into the Abbey and demand to see all its books and correspondence. I'm calling for the Church to carry out its investigation. My aim is to ensure that procedures are put in place to prevent abuse in the future. I hope you would agree that is a good idea. In order to know what must be prevented in the future, it is necessary to acquire a realistic perception of the nature and extent of the abuse in the past, even though relatively few cases might ultimately end in prosecution.

So let's have a think about what that realistic perception consists of. Given the range of dates on which Pearce committed crimes he was convicted of, it is reasonable to infer that he has been an active paedophile for pretty much the whole of the 40 years or so that he was resident at the Abbey. Moreover, we have dozens of accounts of abuse here in comments on this blog, most of them from people who have not yet come forward to the police, or at least hadn't at the time they wrote.

Given the difficulty in coming forward in the first place, and the active work in suppressing complaints which we can infer from the comment by "Paul", it is entirely unrealistic to think that anything but an extremely small proportion of Pearce's crimes have come to trial. But nonetheless, based on what we do know, we can make a conservative estimate of perhaps 3 boys a year whom he abused. That's perhaps 120 boys.

Then there is Maestri. He was at the school for something like 12 years. Chalk him up for an estimate of another 3 a year. That's another 36.

Then there are others about whom comments have been made. Even supposing they between them only account for 50 or so, that puts us over 200 in total. Hundreds is a vague but entirely reasonable estimate. It is the sort of figure indicated by the evidence we have so far. You might choose to make a different estimate. But don't think in terms of saying that since Pearce has only been convicted of abusing 5 boys that this is the total extent of his crimes. That's just wishful thinking, hoping that the problem will go away. I don't expect that Pearce or anybody else will get convicted of hundreds of counts of child abuse, unless I am vastly underestimating the extent of his crimes and they actually number in the thousands. But there isn't evidence to suggest that.

So, if you are former pupil at St. Benedict's School and are a victim of Pearce or anybody else, and feel that the time has come to share the burden you have carried for so long, I have these words for you.

You are not alone. Others have also suffered as you have. You have friends in the world who wish you well and want to help, even though you might never actually meet them.

If you wish, I can put you in touch with other victims of abuse who are willing to share their experiences, so you can compare notes and talk with somebody who really understands in a way I can't, not having been abused myself.

If you wish, I can help you contact the appropriate people within the police. I am assured that you will be taken seriously. The police have specialist units which specialise in child sex abuse, they understand what it takes to talk to them.

If you wish, I can help you find professional assistance which I hope might bring some healing to your life.

Or if all you feel able to do is take the step of privately contacting me in confidence, then I will hear you and take you seriously. Whether and when you take the matter any further is for you to decide, based on your strength and welfare and that of your family. You don't have to take all the decisions at once. Believe me, I have a good idea of how brave you have had to be even to have looked up this page and read down this far.

Unless and until you decide to take it further our correspondence will be confidential. I know what a massive step it is for a victim to confide in anybody at all, even 30 or 40 years after the event.

Naturally I hope that you will in due course feel able to contact the police, but I know enough about the effects of sexual abuse on children to realise what a gigantic step it is even to contemplate this. I will think no less of you if you decide that for now or for ever you feel unable to do so. The great majority of victims never manage it. There is no shame in being part of that majority. But tackling lesser hurdles first can help, for instance talking privately to somebody you decide you can trust. That's a big enough first step by itself. Other steps can be left for another day.

If you wish, you can email me at jonathanwest22@googlemail.com. Or you may decide that talking to a sympathetic member of your family would be better. Or a trusted friend. You do what you think is best for you.

If you read this but don't feel able to make any approach, know that the door will remain open, and you can choose to walk through it some other time.

Requesting an enquiry at Ealing Abbey

Here is an abridged version of an email I sent yesterday to Archbishop Vincent Nichols.

============================

Dear Archbishop

I welcome in particular the following part of today's Statement by the Catholic Bishops of England and Wales

"In our dioceses we will continue to make every effort, working with our safeguarding commissions, to identify any further steps we can take, especially concerning the care of those who have suffered abuse, including anyone yet to come forward with their account of their painful and wounded past. We are committed to continuing the work of safeguarding, and are determined to maintain openness and transparency, in close co-operation with the statutory authorities in our countries."

In pursuit of that specific aim, I request that you institute as soon as possible a wide-ranging enquiry into child sex abuse at Ealing Abbey and St. Benedict's School. There is strong evidence that there has been abuse at the school, involving several monks, priests and lay teachers, extending over decades.

Such reviews as have taken place at Ealing Abbey so far appear to have concentrated solely upon the failure to effectively supervise Father David Pearce once it had been determined that he was a danger to children and had been placed on a restricted ministry. However, as you are aware, Pearce was convicted of sexual and indecent assaults over a 36 year period, and John Maestri, a lay teacher, has been convicted three times of sexual crimes against pupils of St. Benedict's School during his time as teacher there in the 1970s and 1980s. As far as I am aware, no enquiries have yet addressed this longer timescale, why Pearce and others were not detected and stopped sooner, what is the full extent of the abuse that went on there, and who else may have been involved.

My son attended St Benedicts Junior School for two years, when Pearce was Junior School Headteacher. Fortunately for both my son and for me, he was not among Pearce's victims. But as a result I have taken a close interest in the case. Through my blog http://scepticalthoughts.blogspot.com/, a large number of victims have come forward with accounts of abuse by a number of monks and teachers.

Several victims have contacted me privately. I am treating their correspondence as confidential so I shall provide no individual details. But they all tell a very similar story of lives blighted, a loss of respect for adult authority, confusion about their sexuality, destructive and even psychotic behaviour, broken families and difficulty in forming adult relationships. I am doing what I can to offer support to them, by assuring them that they were in no way responsible for the abuses committed against them, and encouraging them to seek the help they need to rebuild their shattered lives and to contact the police to report the crimes against them.

The scandal of St. Benedict's School is not limited to those priests and teachers who actually committed sexual assaults on children. It appears that there was an active effort to silence victims and cover up abuse.

The victims of abuse at St. Benedict's School quite probably number hundreds, only a small proportion of whom have ever come forward. Those who have the strength to report their abuse deserve to have their story heard by a properly run enquiry, which will establish the truth of the matter as far as possible and make recommendations for improvements at the Abbey and the School.

Even after the Pearce and Maestri cases, the school's published child protection policies still fall far below best practice and do not conform to the CSAS guidelines. They are so bad that even the definition of "sexual abuse" depends on a subjective assessment of the extent to which the child involved has an understanding of the activities he is being subjected to. I have raised this matter both the Abbot and the Headmaster, to no effect.

In my opinion there is an imminent, continuing and serious risk of further sexual abuses committed against children at St. Benedict's School. An enquiry is urgently needed in order to prevent future abuse.

The Bishops' apology

Well, this is a bit of a welcome change. From last week when the Catholic Herald's lead headline announced that Archbishop Nichols takes legal advice over newspaper's 'unwarranted slur', the Bishops of England and Wales have issued a statement apologising for the abuse.

Let us be fair, while in some respects it is less than it should be, there are several welcome and positive things in the statement. Here are a few of the high points.

Our first thoughts are for all who have suffered from the horror of these crimes, which inflict such severe and lasting wounds. They are uppermost in our prayer. The distress we feel at what has happened is nothing in comparison with the suffering of those who have been abused.

That is welcome. In the past, the apologies from the church have tended to conflate the suffering of the victims with that of the church itself, as if there were some equivalence between them. This rightly makes it clear that such comparisons are odious.

The criminal offences committed by some priests and religious are a profound scandal. They bring deep shame to the whole church.

A statement of the obvious, but not something we have heard quite so directly before. We progress.

We express our heartfelt apology and deep sorrow to those who have suffered abuse, those who have felt ignored, disbelieved or betrayed. We ask their pardon, and the pardon of God for these terrible deeds done in our midst. There can be no excuses.

The Bishops seem to have suffered from another acute attack of passive voice. Even now, they seem to find it difficult to find a form of words which makes it clear that abuses don't just happen, they are committed by abusers. But at least they are not offering excuses and are saying there can be none. So, two cheers for this.

Furthermore, we recognise the failings of some Bishops and Religious leaders in handling these matters. These, too, are aspects of this tragedy which we deeply regret and for which we apologise. The procedures now in place in our countries highlight what should have been done straightaway in the past. Full co-operation with statutory bodies is essential.

Oh dear. They still can't bear to bring themselves to utter the word "cover-up". They are still being entirely unspecific as to what the "failings of some Bishops and Religious leaders" have actually consisted of.

Any organisation which has responsibilities for the care and welfare of children will attract its share of paedophiles. Therefore, from time to time, abuses will happen. Whether the priesthood has a few more paedophiles or a few less than comparable occupations such teaching is neither here nor there. What matters is the institutional handling of this. What is required is really very simple to describe, and not all that hard to implement.

• There has to be culture of awareness, so that the honest non-paedophiles know what to look out for, and how to report it.
• There need to be clear procedures for reporting abuse
• There need to be clear procedures for handling complaints, including where necessary temporarily removing the subject of a complaint from contact with children while an investigation is undertaken.
  
• There need to be clear procedures for rapidly removing abusers from contact with children.
  

The overall aim is to keep known dangers away from children in the first place, to detect any instances of abuse quickly, and to stop them immediately.

The true scandal of the Catholic Church is not that it has some paedophiles within the clergy, it is that the Church's institutional response could hardly have caused more harm over a longer duration to the maximum number of victims had it been designed with that specific aim in mind.

Now, we believe, is a time for deep prayer of reparation and atonement.

Many, perhaps even most of the victims are no longer Catholics or even believers of any kind. Their faith has been shattered by the betrayal of trust inflicted on them by their clergy. You can pray if you wish to, but I doubt that many of the victims will be in the least bit impressed by this. It is unfortunate that this is the first response the Bishops list. When discussing the Pope's apology about the scandal, I mentioned that there was a bit of Father Ted about this.

This is how Father Ted and his fellow priests would address the problem.

"The whole institutional response of the church to sexual abuse has been shown to be corrupt and ineffective. What shall we do?"
"I know! Let's say Mass."

In our dioceses we will continue to make every effort, working with our safeguarding commissions, to identify any further steps we can take, especially concerning the care of those who have suffered abuse, including anyone yet to come forward with their account of their painful and wounded past. We are committed to continuing the work of safeguarding, and are determined to maintain openness and transparency, in close co-operation with the statutory authorities in our countries.

This is very good - if the Bishops live up to it. There is a lot of work still to do. Because of the shame and guilt involved, it can take victims decades before they summon the courage to come forward. There are probably 30 years of abuse stories still to come out.

I've written to the Archbishop asking him to make a start by setting up an enquiry into the goings-on at Ealing Abbey these past few decades. I'll publish that letter in the next article.