An overview report by the NBSCCCI of the implementation of recommendations by those reviewed in the sixth tranche of Safeguarding Reviews – 31 August 2015
In October 2014, 8 Religious Congregations and Orders publicly made available child safeguarding review reports produced by the NBSCCCI. These Congregations and Orders were:
The Pallottine Fathers; The Union of Presentation Sisters; The Vincentian Fathers; The Redemptorists; St Joseph’s Missionary Society (Mill Hill Fathers); The Sisters of St Louis; Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary; The Missionaries of Africa (White Fathers).
n the intervening months, each of these Religious Congregations and Orders have been actively putting in place new policies, procedures and changing their safeguarding practices to fulfil the requirements of the recommendations made in their review reports. Discussions have taken place with NBSCCCI and where requested advice offered to the Church Authority.
In July, 2015, 9 months after the reports were made public, at the request of NBSCCCI, each of the Church Authorities have submitted an update report on the implementation of the recommendations made by the reviewers.
It is important to point out that The National Board has not conducted an” in-depth” analysis of practice as part of this exercise and that this process of informing the Board about progress in relation to implementing the recommendation is not a “re-review”. The Board has not revisited any of these Congregations and Orders to conduct further fieldwork and is therefore not in a position to offer a critique of the work undertaken by each Church Authority. Having said that, following the publication of the Review Reports, there has been regular contact between the Church Authorities and the CEO, on how to implement the recommendations made by the reviewers.
It is important to highlight that advice offered by the CEO was for some Orders/Congregations to defer the revision of some aspects of their policy and procedures until the revised safeguarding Standards have been produced by the NBSCCCI in 2016. Some Church Authorities wanted to put in place interim arrangements and this has been supported by the National Board.
Once again, it is reassuring to read from the submissions made by the Church Authorities, the extent of work that has gone into improving practice within each of the Orders/Congregations in this Tranche. The Review process has been embraced with serious endeavour and the changes made by each of the Church Authorities demonstrate their commitment to improving practice and responding to the recommendations, in the interests of further safeguarding children in the Catholic Church in Ireland.
Teresa Devlin
Chief Executive Officeer
Details on each update report can be found at the following links:
Pallottines: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-Ihhua_tCwIRUFwTW05S0Y3akk/view?pli=1
Presentation Union: http://www.presentationsistersunion.org/_uploads/rsfil/04832.pdf
Vincentians: http://vincentians.ie/implementation-of-review-recommendations/
Redemptorists: http://www.redemptorists.ie/about/child-safeguarding/
Mill Hill:
Sisters of St Louis: http://stlouissisters.org/images/documents/Child_Safeguarding/review_safeguarding_practice_recommendations.pdf
Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary http://www.sacredheartsjm.org/Follow_up_on_Recommendations_Table__docx.pdf
Missionaries of Africa: http://www.africamission-mafr.org/Follow_up_on_Recommendations_of_our_child_protection-audit.pdf