Regular readers will know that the Church of England used to have a problem with safeguarding, and didn’t know how to deal effectively with allegations of abuse, didn’t know how to respond well to victims and survivors; and prioritised its own institutional reputation over the needs those who have suffered abuse at the hands of clergy and senior lay people in the Church.

Of course, all that changed at the General Synod in February, which was described in advance by Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell, other bishops, and Archbishops’ Council staff as a “watershed moment” on safeguarding, a chance to put everything right, and that the Church had finally learned the lessons that it had studiously ignored over several recent decades.

Yes. I’m being facetious. Nothing has changed.

This week the Church of England announced the membership of the Crown Nominations Commission (CNC) – the body that will select Justin Welby’s successor as Archbishop of Canterbury.

We already knew that Archbishop Cottrell was on the commission. I don’t know what to think of this: here is somebody with a woeful track record on safeguarding helping to select somebody to succeed someone who had to step down because of safeguarding failings. The fact that he is on the Commission means that Cottrell can’t be considered for the role. So that’s good, but at 66 years of age (67 by the time the appointment would take place) he was likely to be too old to be considered anyway, considering the mandatory retirement age of 70 for bishops (including archbishops) in the Church of England.

His membership of the Commission also means that he is likely to turn a blind eye to any safeguarding failings of potential candidates. We know this because it is a matter of public record that this is exactly what he has done in the past.

It would be entirely appropriate – and I think very helpful – if Archbishop Cottrell were to recuse himself from any meetings of the Crown Nominations Commission dealing with the selection of the next Archbishop of Canterbury, while also making clear that he would not accept any nomination for the role.

The Archbishops’ Council has announced that its National Safeguarding Team and the Dioceses of Chelmsford and Southwark have commissioned a Safeguarding Practice Review in the case of David Tudor – this will inevitably look at Archbishop Cottrell’s own woeful actions in this case – actions which he has subsequent found to have lied about in media statements. While this review is ongoing, it is an appalling position that Cottrell should be helping to choose somebody to fill an archiepiscopal seat left vacant because the previous holder resigned because of safeguarding failings.

With all this in mind, if the Church of England really has used its “watershed moment” on safeguarding to put everything right and to learn the lessons it has studiously ignored over several recent decades, then it would surely be right for Cottrell to step down from any aspect of selecting the next Archbishop of Canterbury.

Has the Church of England learned its lessons?

Am I just harping on about things that have happened in the past, before the “watershed moment”?

This week I received a press release and a copy of an open letter from the “ISB Survivors Group”. A quick re-cap: when the Archbishops’ Council disbanded its “Independent Safeguarding Board” (ISB) for being, er, “independent”, it promised that it would continue to support those victims and survivors that the ISB had been working with and would continue to progress the promised independent reviews into their cases and how they have been treated by the Church of England.

That was two years ago. They are still waiting for their reviews.

I publish below a copy of their press release and their open letter to the Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell. Reading this, one wonders whether the Archbishop should not only recuse himself from the CNC, but should also be suspended from ministry to prevent him from carrying on the re-abuse of victims and survivors.

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PRESS RELEASE FROM THE ISB SURVIVORS GROUP

Survivors of Church Abuse Demand Action from the Archbishop of York

The ISB Survivors Group has today issued the attached open letter to the Archbishop of York.

We are survivors of abuse within the Church of England. We are the very individuals who were promised independent reviews by the Church, following the Independent Inquiry into child sexual abuse (IICSA). Many of us had already begun our reviews through the Independent Safeguarding Board (ISB) — until the Archbishops’ Council abruptly dismissed the ISB Board Members, halting the process and denying us the justice we were due.

Our group includes IICSA core participants, survivors of Bishop Peter Ball, and victims of John Smyth, amongst others. Some of us have been battling for our complaints — including those against senior bishops and Archbishops’ Council members — to be heard for over 30 Years.

It has now been almost two years since the dismissal of the ISB Board. No meaningful or credible alternatives for resuming our reviews have been proposed. While the Archbishop of York has agreed to meet with us, he continues to refuse discussion of the very issues we need to address.

For 23 months, we have been left without any independent support. The Church’s proposed “independent” support included individuals closely connected to the National Safeguarding Team (NST) — a blatant conflict of interest. The “independent” advocate assigned to survivors worked directly for the Church of England. One other complication is that the Archbishop of York’s own behaviour would be subject to scrutiny in the very reviews that he is effectively preventing from progressing.

We are exhausted by the Church’s failure to act and by what we perceive as manipulative stalling from both the Archbishop of York and the deeply discredited National Safeguarding Team. The re-abuse and cruelty needs to stop.

Our lives have already been shattered by horrific, sadistic, and systemic abuse. We will not tolerate continued mistreatment from an institution that professes to follow Christ.

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An Open letter to The Archbishop of York and Archbishops Council

Dear Archbishop Cottrell,

STRICTLY WITHOUT PREJUDICE

We are in receipt of your communication sent to Dame Jasvinder Sanghera in early February and after much consideration individually, as well having met as a group, are now ready to reply.

All of us agreed that the best word to describe your letter was “abusive” and that consequently need to say that we find that it impossible to see Jesus in you.

Your abusive letter has made us realize that if we were to engage any further with you, even with the assistance of others, or to engage with your fellow members of the Archbishops’ Council, their agents (let alone your utterly discredited and menacing national safeguarding staff), that there is a substantial risk that it might be seen by others as a sign that it was perhaps safe for them to engage with you in any way. However, it is very clear to us, having read and deliberated upon the contents of your letter, that there is a very high risk that you potentially expose us to experiencing substantially worse further trauma that would cause us (already victims of sexual and spiritual abuse from your organization) irreparable and in some cases even mortal harm.

Archbishop Cottrell, we see you as a diabolical monster bent on causing us further harm and after receiving your letter we shall not communicate with you, your colleagues or agents any further: quite simply we do not believe it would be safe for us to do so. Consequently, we strongly advise any other vulnerable man, woman or child also to keep away from you and your discredited organization – one that seems to delight in its core business of causing ever-increasing violence against those who are vulnerable.

You use the word “robust” to describe safeguarding in your church, however your often repeated use of this word merely means to us an escalation in the abuse that we continue to receive from you and your business organization. For many of us, we see in you an individual worse than Bishop Peter Ball or John Smyth – indeed some of us wonder whether your desire to harm us is based in a similar perversion of Jesus and His love.

Christians are supposed to show the Light of Christ but in you, Archbishop Cottrell, we see merely darkness – no doubt your insistence to meet with Dame Jasvinder Sanghera and Mr Reeves “on a private and confidential basis” would also be held by you in the dark – a refuge to which you are perhaps unseemingly more inclined than the Light of Jesus.

Finally, as for your “apologies to all survivors for the trauma they have experienced” and that you wish to “seek to find a way forward to minimize any further trauma to the group” (failing to mention seeking to address the substantial harm you, your colleagues and business agents have already caused), from our own experience we simply do not believe a word of it and never will – nor arguably should anyone else.

We suggest that you appoint a TRULY Independent Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) to move things forward URGENTLY.

Yours sincerely,

The ISB SURVIVORS GROUP

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