Sharp rise in allegations of child sex abuse to church watchdog

A SIGNIFICANT increase in the number of allegations and suspicions concerning clerical child abuse have been repoted by the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church.

New figures published in the National Board’s (NBSCCCl) annual report reveal the safeguarding watchdog dealt with 135 allegations, suspicions and concerns during 2017-18, up from 86 the previous year.

This reverses the downward trend of the previous three years in allegations of abuse and alleged perpetrators.

One hundred and four of these new allegations relate to child sexual abuse.

This is a significant increase on 2016/17, when the number of new allegations of child sexual abuse was 72.

In its report, the child protection body hit out at the Church’s care and support for victims warning that pastors and priests need to acquire some special knowledge about child abuse and its consequences in order “not to further damage a deeply wounded and suffering person”.

Teresa Devlin revealed that some of the alleged victims of abuse had said their bad experience “created further distancing and fear”.

In other cases, the National Board report said it was clear that drift has been occurring, leaving both complainants and respondents in a limbo situation without satisfactory resolution.

The 2012 Criminal Justice (Withholding of Information on Offences against Children and Vulnerable Persons) Act does not allow for confessional privilege, however the Church forbids priests from breaching the seal of confession, even