CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY OPENING NOTE FOR FIONA SCOLDING QC ANGLICAN INVESTIGATION- WIDER CHURCH HEARING 1 - 12 JULY 2019 1. Chair and Panel, I am Fiona Scolding Q.C. , senior counsel to this Anglican investigation. Seated to my right are Ms. Nikita McNeill and Ms. Lara McCaffrey, junior counsel to this investigation. 2. Having introduced the Inquiry representatives, I now turn to other core participants. To my right: (a)Representatives for the complainants, victims and survivors represented by Slater and Gordon – Mr. Richard Scorer of Slater and Gordon, and Mr. Iain O’Donnell of counsel (b)Counsel for the Complainants, victims and survivors represented by Switalskis – Mr David Greenwood, and Mr. William Chapman of counsel. (c)Mr. Chapman also represents the Ministry and Clergy Sexual Abuse Survivors organisation, known as MACSAS. Turning behind me, (d) representing the Archbishop’s Council – Mr. Nigel Giffin Q.C (e) To my rear and right, Counsel for the Ecclesiastical Insurance Office, Mr. Rory Philips Q.C 1 Footnotes for internal reference only CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY (f) On the left hand benches, Counsel for the Church in Wales, Mr. Mark Powell QC (g) Counsel for the National Police Chiefs Council, Mr James Berry. (h)Counsel for the Department of Education, Ms Emily Wilsdon (1-9 July 2019). We understand that Mr Benjamin Seifert will attend for the DFE for some of next week also (10-11 July 2019). 3. There are no preliminary matters which the core participants wish to raise. Introductory remarks 4. The aim of these hearings is to examine whether the Church of England is currently giving sufficient priority to ensuring that churches are places are entirely safe and the voices of those who have difficult things to say are heard and acted upon. 5. The Inquiry has already heard a significant amount of evidence and received written statements and documentation about the Church of England during the course of both the Chichester and Peter Ball case study hearings, which will be used during this hearing where relevant and informative. We seek in this hearing to build upon that which we have already learnt. To remind everyone, when I talk about the Church in these opening remarks, I mean the Church of England, or the Church in Wales, and sometimes both Churches. 2 Footnotes for internal reference only CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY 6. I will spend the first part of this opening dealing with issues which predominantly relate to the Church of England. I will then provide an explanation and some background about the Church in Wales and the issues they have faced in respect of child sexual abuse. 7. The themes we will be examining during this hearing are: a. The views of victims and survivors as to the failures of the Church currently and what steps they consider should be taken to improve safeguarding practice. b. An examination of the appropriateness of reparations made by the Church, and the role of insurers in civil claims. c. The Current safeguarding practices and policies of the Church of England and the Church in Wales, and steps to be taken in the near future. d. Whether the current structure for safeguarding in both Churches are adequate to keep children safe. e. The handling of non recent allegations of abuse, and of posthumous allegations. 3 Footnotes for internal reference only CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY f. The current system for auditing and providing external scrutiny and whether it is capable of highlighting deficiciences in policies or practices. g. Safeguarding in practice. 8. Behind all these specific areas of inquiry lies the largest question - which is whether the culture of the Church as it was and is, is capable of dealing appropriately with safeguarding. Culture, as the Bishop of Blackburn’s letter of 17 June 2019 to his clergy says, is made up of structures, decisions and appointments. Part of this hearing will be spent examining casework recently carried out in dioceses across England and Wales to see if the culture has changed to one where the protection of children, rather than the reputation of the Church and those within it, is paramount. 9. Most of you in this room are familiar with the language and terminology associated with both the Church of England and Church in Wales. For the benefit of those not familiar with it, when I mention the word clergy, I mean someone who is a vicar, priest, rector or curate – i.e. someone who the church has granted “holy orders”. They are usually office holders – i.e. neither employed nor self employed. By Bishop I mean someone who has been appointed by the Church to be the chief pastor in a Diocese- the “cure of souls” to use the language of the Church. When we refer to a clerical title, or term of art during 4 Footnotes for internal reference only CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY this hearing, I will seek to explain it in ordinary language, or ask the witness to do so. Complainants, victims and survivors 10. As at previous hearings, we refer to those where abuse has been proven, either by way of criminal conviction, civil findings or findings in the context of disciplinary proceedings as victims or survivors. In circumstances where there have been no such findings, individuals are referred to as complainants. 11. We will spend part of these hearings listening to the voices of complainants, victims and survivors. We thank all of those who have contributed to this investigation and pay tribute to their courage in providing us with their accounts, recognising the emotional distress that this hearing may cause to them. We also recognise there will be others who may not have told anyone about their abuse, or wish to keep such private. As I have said before, the scars of sexual abuse in childhood are often indelible. 12. We will hear about abuse alleged to have been perpetrated by senior members of the clergy, including Bishops. We will hear of the reluctance or failure to report known abuse: we will hear of a lack of curiosity about or outright indifference to allegations when disclosed, and the grant of permission to officiate in cases where abuse was known to have occurred. We will also hear more about failures in record keeping – something 5 Footnotes for internal reference only CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY which seems trivial until one realises how far it can hamper an effective response to safeguarding as vital information is missing or placed out of reach. 13. We will hear about the abuse of power: about clergy who considered themselves to be able to operate by different rules: about the sense of entitlement that can come with a clerical collar and how that has made others unduly deferential or unwilling to criticise figures of authority in their lives. Data about the Church of England 14. The Church of England has provided us with information about all known cases of convictions for sexual offending involving children in the recent past. We have a list of 390 individuals who are either clergy, or in positions of trust in respect of the Church of England – for example, choirmasters, and where the acts of abuse were carried out in circumstances where those individuals were ostensibly performing their Church of England role. This includes individuals who offended in a domestic or educational setting. A significant amount of this offending involves the downloading of, or possession of, indecent images of children. 15. We also have a list of claims brought against dioceses in the Church of England in the recent past, which amount to some 330 in total, although it should be noted that some of the claims 6 Footnotes for internal reference only CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY involve the same offender. The vast majority of these claims relate to sexual offending carried out before 1990, with significant numbers in the 1960’s and 1970’s. 16. The Church of England has provided us with some statistics about the number of safeguarding concerns which were reported to dioceses from 2015 onwards about children or vulnerable adults. In 2015, some 1,052 concerns were reported. In 2017, this had increased to 1,257. 53% of the total number of safeguarding reports in 2017 related to sexual abuse. The proportion of those concerns which were then referred to statutory authorities has remained at around a third throughout this period. 17. Of the allegations set out above, 736 allegations were made about church officers in 2017 – so around a quarter of the total allegations made about children and vulnerable adults. Of those allegations around 43% were about clergy. The majority of allegations made against clergy concerned sexual abuse – some 62% in 2017. 21% of all allegations concerned those in voluntary positions. Around half of all cases referred to dioceses both about children and vulnerable adults involving clerics were reported to statutory agencies. 18. Disciplinary measures were taken in 72 cases in 2017 – with 39 cases being brought under the Clergy Discipline Measure and 33 under lay disciplinary procedures. 36 individuals were 7 Footnotes for internal reference only CONFIDENTIAL- CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY referred to the Disclosure and Barring Service in 2017, to determine whether they need to be placed upon the list they maintain for those unsuitable to work with children or vulnerable adults. Responding to abuse 19. The culture and clericalism of the Church of England in the past, as we have seen in the case studies involving both the Diocese of Chichester and the late Peter Ball, may have lent themselves to being places where those who wished to abuse children could hide, often in plain sight.