 The Church will implement all recommendations from the McLellan Report Peter Kearney, Director of the Scottish Catholic Media
Office, has called for fairness by the media in reporting the issue of child
abuse in the Catholic Church. Mr Kearney suggests that official figures show that the
problem in the Church is tiny compared to the problem as a whole across
Scotland. Indeed, it is believed that
only 0.3% of abuse complaints over the past ten years were against Catholic
clergy and volunteers. Yet, despite this
figure, the media appear determined to castigate the Church as offender in
chief when it comes to the awful reality of child abuse. As Peter Kearney says, the “robust attention” of the media
around this issue is to be “welcomed” as it “serves to strengthen the resolve
of those working within the Church to be as transparent and accountable as
possible. Survivors deserve that.” But there appears to be a disproportionate
focus on the Church, especially when you consider the figures quoted. As we have said before, the Catholic Church in Scotland
should now be the safest place for children given the work it is doing to
ensure that deplorable mistakes from the past are not repeated. Following the McLellan Commission’s report
last year the Church accepted all eight recommendations of the Commission in
relation to the safeguarding of children and vulnerable persons and expects all
eight to be fully implemented by the end of 2017. Perhaps one of the biggest moves by the Church has been to
release an annual audit of all abuse allegations against its clergy and
volunteers. This is made public thus
ensuring transparency and easy access to the figures for the media and the
general public, all of whom have a vested interest in this issue. Sadly, such transparency is not forthcoming
from other churches in Scotland. Indeed,
no other organised church in Scotland releases data in this way. And they are not alone. The NHS, Police Scotland, local authorities
and national youth and voluntary groups have thus far failed to step up to the
plate and release audits of abuse allegations. As Peter Kearney says, “All abuse is utterly wrong and must
always be condemned”, but “narratives suggesting the Catholic Church has a
disproportionate problem and wider society hasn’t, is a terrible
deception. Survivors deserve
better.” Click this link to read the full article at Scotsman.com: http://www.scotsman.com/news/comment-the-church-deserves-balanced-reporting-1-4097241 |
