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Is safeguarding in sport fit for purpose? Our written submission to the House of Lords Sport and Recreation Committee

Our now published written evidence dated 24 May 2021 is available here for download.

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June 13th, 2021|

Boarding Schools’ Association says it wants Mandatory Reporting | (as long as it doesn’t work)

In recent weeks the Sunday Times has run a series of articles about non-recent sexual and physical abuse in boarding schools. The articles stemmed from Louis de Bernières going public about the abusive time he had while a pupil at Grenham House in Birchington, Kent.

Here’s the first article, the second and the most recent from 02.05.21 is below:

Sunday Times 2 May 2021
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May 8th, 2021|

Scotland : Child abuse victims are still going undetected  || Yet Scottish academics still mistakenly reject mandatory reporting

On 22nd October 2020 an article by Dr Sarah Nelson of the Centre for Research for Families and Relationships appeared in The Scotsman.

The Scotsman 22.10.20. You can read the article here

The reader is informed :

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November 11th, 2020|

The Whyte Review – some considerations.

It is hoped the Whyte Review reveals abuses and safeguarding shortcomings within gymnastics and makes appropriate recommendations. That said it’s important to appreciate the limitations of such reviews. Unlike a statutory inquiry no clubs or coaches can be compelled to provide evidence. Recommendations Anne Whyte QC makes might or might not be adopted by the sports body in question. Those that are adopted then have to be delivered, sustained and enforced by the very organisations under whose umbrella the shortcomings occurred. We highlight some further challenges below and hope when it concludes that British Gymnastics will publish annual safeguarding data to evidence how the review has impacted safeguarding and to give parents of future gymnasts the confidence to enrol their children in the sport.

Here is some background …..

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October 15th, 2020|

Mandate Now observations on Law in Sport article about mandatory reporting for sport

The Law In Sport article was published on 30th July 2020. Mandate Now was sent a link by a social media follower who correctly thought it would interest us. It’s author Richard Bush is an Associate in Bird & Bird’s Sports Group, We have interpolated our comments into his article below using this ‘comment’ format in italics. All photographs and sound files form part of our commentary.

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August 3rd, 2020|

Here are the 779 submissions made to the 2016 ‘Reporting and Acting on Child Abuse and Neglect’ consultation. Councils, Royal College’s healthcare, education, faith, NGO’s and similar

The Information Commissioner’s Office ruled in our favour against the Home Office requiring it to provide us with the submissions to the MR consultation.

The submissions provide useful information, but it’s a depressing picture of sparse safeguarding understanding in so many Regulated Activities. It is the Department for Education which is responsible for the disrepair and dysfunction within the safeguarding framework that fails staff, children and their parents. The framework’s design emerged from social work practice, dominated as it is by familial neglect and its consequences. The resulting thicket of confusion was then misapplied to strategically important and complex Regulated Activities in a thoughtless ‘one size fits’ all approach. As data reveals these settings require the legislative foundation of well-designed MR.

Like us you may find many of the responses from professional bodies quite inexplicable.

Surprisingly perhaps, no National Governing Bodies of sport made a submission to the consultation. Why not? Neither did the Catholic Church or the Church of England with the exception of the Diocese of Canterbury (see #556 and the answer to Q7), and it’s worth reading.

To use the data, we suggest you click on ‘Index of Consultation Responses’ and either scroll through or word search what you are looking for. Then open ‘consultation responses’ and go to the corresponding index number.

Index of Consultation Responses

Consultation Responses

January 31st, 2020|

‘The Church has some form of Mandatory Reporting’ (Peter Hancock – Lead Bishop for Safeguarding) | “Oh no it hasn’t!”

It’s panto season – is it ever not with Church of England Safeguarding ?

On the 14th July 2019, Bishop Peter Hancock featured on BBC r4 Sunday programme which reported on IICSA’s final hearing into child abuse within the Anglican Church.

During the programme, which highlighted that Archbishops Welby and Sentamu both called for the introduction of statutory mandatory reporting Peter Hancock, the lead Bishop for safeguarding, in an ‘off-air’ exchange with the BBC journalist, said this:

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January 16th, 2020|

It’s inconceivable IICSA will fail to recommend well-designed Mandatory Reporting.

A summary of IICSA MR Seminars 1 + 2 with some background.

In Spring 2018 many of us wondered if IICSA’s long promised mandatory reporting (‘MR’) seminar would ever happen. Well-designed MR is a key component of functioning safeguarding, particularly for Regulated Activities. It introduces responsibility and accountability to these strategically important institutional roles where only nominal responsibility and accountability exists presently. It’s in these settings that children spend most time after time with family. Importantly, and always overlooked, MR law also protects staff who are mandated to report known or suspected abuse. This rarely recognised element is as important as the obligation to report.

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December 28th, 2019|

Remaining silent about child abuse can’t be an option – Times Scotland 21.9.19

The full article as it appeared in the Times is here.

Here is the pre-edited draft sent to The Times which contains important additional facts and supporting data :

‘It’s all different now’ is the default refrain from those who today are responsible for safeguarding in institutional settings such as education, sport, healthcare and faith. The amount of time spent by children in these operationally complex places is second only to time spent with their families. But the assertion begs the question, how is it all different now when today there is still no statutory obligation on ‘professionals’ working in positions of trust to report known or suspected abuse of a child to the authorities for independent assessment? (more…)

August 22nd, 2019|

Top 10 Myths About Clergy Abuse in the Catholic Church (Psychology Today) 1/8/19 and a reply from Tim Lennon the President of SNAP

A ‘ping’ notified us of an article in Psychology Today (1/8/19) titled “Top 10 Myths About Clergy Abuse in the Catholic Church.”  1) It doesn’t happen?  Not quite, but the article by Thomas G Plant Ph.D., ABPP  suggests it’s de minimis.

We decided to email Tim Lennon the President of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (“SNAP”) to seek his opinion  and invited him to respond, particularly as Dr Plant is an American academic  :

Reply to Church Apologist :

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August 4th, 2019|