Saturday, September 18, 2010

Protecting our children

IS it no more than an interesting coincidence that on the same day that Pope Benedict XVl offers his most frank admission of the failure of the Catholic Church's handling of paedophile priests, the Archbishop of Dublin pointedly criticises inadequacies in the way the Irish State deals with child abuse?

Speaking to reporters during his flight to Britain for an historic state visit, the Pope conceded that the church had not dealt with abusive priests decisively or quickly enough, while, in Dublin, Dr Diarmuid Martin expressed his concern about the slowness in addressing weaknesses in our current legislation, inadequacies in the resources available to the Health Service Executive, and "a lack of clarity" in the mandate of the HSE regarding the abuse of children outside a family framework.

The archbishop did not attempt to shift blame for failings wholly on to the State, however, he acknowledged the immense suffering of victims of abuse and added, "abuse was reinforced by covering it up".

This must be the bluntest admission yet by a senior churchman of a clerical cover up, just as significant as the Pope's acknowledgment that church leaders had been "insufficiently vigilant" in face of what he called "this perversion of the priestly ministry".

However, Dr Martin's wake-up call to the State is well founded, although, even coming from a clergyman so widely respected as he, it probably offers some hostages to fortune.

The Ryan report told of Department of Education officials dismissing or ignoring complaints of child sexual abuse on a vast scale.

Lax inspection, lack of regulation and refusal to accept responsibility remain familiar aspects of life in Ireland today, as they were in the '40s and '50s.

The Irish child protection system has been variously described as unsympathetic, powerful and intimidating by gardai, the children's ombudsman and parents.

Strengthening our ineffective sex-offenders' register and allocating proper resources to gardai to monitor offenders would be welcome first steps.

The Pope and the archbishop have acknowledged failings on the past and, in the past, Benedict has described child abuse as a heinous crime.

However, he has yet to state that the practice of moving known abusers from parish to parish, without reporting their crimes to the police, was itself a heinous crime.

SIC: II/IE