Catholic Church

Structural barriers

• Survivors face numerous barriers when disclosing abuse to the Catholic Church, made worse by the very structure of the Church. The Catholic Church has not taken sufficient steps to reduce these barriers for survivors.
• There have been failures by bishops and religious superiors to use procedures under canon law, or to use them properly. In addition, only the Holy See can permanently remove a priest or bishop from ministry, but responses from the Holy See are often delayed. This suggests the rights of alleged abusers being prioritised over survivor needs and over the prevention of further abuse.

Historical response

• The Church was aware of allegations of abuse, and actions were taken on a case-by-case basis. However, there were only very limited attempts at a unified, national approach for responding to such allegations prior to the early 1990s.

Current processes

• Te Houhanga Rongo – A Path to Healing was first introduced in 1998 and remains limited to reports of sexual abuse by clergy and religious. Not all religious institutes have accepted the role of National Office of Professional Standards and the Complaints Assessment Committee. 
• The Catholic Church still does not have a consistent approach to addressing reports of abuse that do not include sexual abuse by the clergy and religious.
• One of the four principles of Te Houhanga Rongo – A Path to Healing is fairness and natural justice. The principle states that “in any inquiry the quest for truth will be paramount and will be based on the principles of natural justice.” In practice, the “quest for the truth” translates into an investigative response dominated by the search for corroboration of a survivor’s account in the context of most abuse occurring in secrecy. 
• More emphasis is placed on investigation rather than treating the survivor with empathy and compassion. Survivors’ interests are not paramount in the Catholic Church’s redress policy or in its redress process generally.
• Catholic institutions frequently fail to provide appropriate care and support for survivors during redress processes or criminal proceedings.
• Prior to the inquiry, the Catholic church had generally not attempted to collect or analyse information about reports of abuse, including about the prevalence of abuse. Poor record-keeping, a culture of secrecy and an apparent lack of interest or inclination to understand the nature and extent of abuse has meant the church leaders had limited insight into systemic issues impacting the safety of those in its care.

Independence

• In the context of church processes, despite the existence of the National Office of Professional Standards and the Complaints Assessment Committee, bishops and leaders of religious institutes still have authority over redress outcomes following an investigation process. Dioceses and religious institutes still have entirely autonomous power and authority over redress outcomes following an investigation process.
• Individuals seeking redress have no way to appeal against the decision of the Complaints Assessment Committee. They are limited to a review of process under Te Houhanga Rongo – A Path to Healing.

Accessibility

• While the Catholic Church has a significant Pacific community, there has been no incorporation of Pacific peoples’ worldviews into any redress processes.
• The Catholic Church has incorporated limited measures to increase accessibility of reporting and redress process for Deaf and disabled survivors.
• The Catholic Church has generally not proactively sought out those who were abused in the care of the Church. 

Application of te Tiriti

• The Catholic Church has policies that emphasise its commitment to biculturalism, but it does not sufficiently involve Māori in designing, implementing or reforming its redress process, or incorporate tikanga Māori or te ao Māori values into its redress process.

Accountability

• Leaders of Catholic Church authorities did not prioritise their duty to assess and minimise risk of further offending when responding to reports of abuse. We consider that they deemed redress processes and responses to survivors as separate to safeguarding responses. This ignores a key motivation of survivors to come forward which is to prevent further abuse.

Anglican Church

Structural barriers

• The Anglican Church’s governing body, the General Synod, has failed to implement to a national redress process despite internal calls for change.
• Regional dioceses and amorangi have adopted different processes, policies, and outcomes, when dealing with redress (if at all). These processes, policies, and outcomes have tended to be opaque, not written down or publicly available, and dependent on the particular bishop of an area. 
• Prior to 2020, some bishops intentionally encouraged clergy who were abusers to resign rather than be disciplined, have taken different approaches to record keeping, including intentional record destruction, and have failed or refused to share information about abuse to other parts of the church.

Barriers to disclosure

• Survivors face numerous barriers when disclosing abuse to the Anglican Church. The Anglican Church has failed to take sufficient steps to understand or mitigate these barriers for survivors.
• The Anglican Church has very rarely taken proactive steps to seek out survivors of abuse in their care.  
   

Current and proposed processes

• There is no current redress process, in written form, only an amended professional disciplinary process (Title D) which is inadequate for dealing with redress.  
• The church inconsistently distinguishes between complaints and claims which confuses survivors and church leadership and can act as a barrier to redress.
• There is an ongoing focus on mediation as a means of resolving abuse claims, despite evidence that it is not appropriate for redress.
• The new Title D process is legalistic, focuses on the fitness of the abuser to minister, provides inadequate support and outcomes for survivors, and uses terminology that is not accessible or well defined.
• Draft claims processes (both former and current) still have one person (either Bishop or Registrar) as the gatekeeper to resolution of claims and complaints despite evidence that a single gatekeeper can be a barrier to disclosure.

Application of te Tiriti

• Most processes and policy documents in place for handling reports of abuse do not use reo Māori or include references to tikanga Māori or te Tiriti. This is despite the church’s strong commitments in its Constitution to te Tiriti and working in partnership with the Tikanga Māori branch of the church.
• Some ministry units within the seven Tikanga Pākehā dioceses, do not understand the church’s constitutional commitments to te Tiriti, or have failed to work in partnership with the Tikanga Māori branch of the church, and as a result have lacked cultural capability.

Accessibility

• Despite the three Tikanga model, and its stated ideal of cultural equality, the previous and current process and policy documents in place for handling abuse show no real consideration of any other cultures, particularly Māori and Pacific peoples, Deaf or disabled persons, or people with other vulnerabilities. Nor do communications around the complaints process.

Interactions with survivors

• The Anglican Church has systemically failed to provide adequate communications about processes for reporting abuse and for seeking redress.
• With a lack of national action by the General Synod, and in the face of long standing inadequate and inconsistent regional approaches, it has often been left to survivors to drive redress outcomes and seek change. 
• Survivors who were members of the Anglican Church, and their supporters, often felt ostracised from their church community after disclosing abuse and advocating for change.

The Salvation Army

Historical response

• The Salvation Army did not have specific processes in place to deal with early complaints or allegations of abuse between the 1950s and 1970s. It had broader policies and processes in place to deal with complaints against officers, but there were several instances where these policies and processes were ineffective.

Current processes

• The Salvation Army claims process does not incorporate pastoral or spiritual rehabilitation or healing elements, unless expressly requested by a claimant, and operates in a ‘silo’ isolated from expert social services available within the overall organisation.
• While The Salvation Army is responsive to specific survivor redress requests, survivors often remain unaware that they can make these requests, even if other forms of redress would contribute to their healing.
• Many survivors feel unheard or disbelieved, even if The Salvation Army upholds their complaint.
• Its claims process is too reliant on the expertise and experience of a single individual, and its effectiveness would be seriously diminished if a replacement were not trained up in time to take over from him.
• Although The Salvation Army’s claims process has been in operation for 18 years, The Salvation Army has never conducted a formal review of how it works and how the process could be improved. 

Independence

• Its claims process is not independent and consequently some survivors felt it was not impartial or objective.
• The Salvation Army has no formal mechanism for independent review to deal with complaints about its claims process, and no means of appeal for those dissatisfied with the process and outcome.

Application of te Tiriti

• The Salvation Army has policies that emphasise its commitment to biculturalism, but it does not involve Māori in designing its claims process or incorporate tikanga Māori or te ao Māori values into its claims process.

Accessibility

• Until 2021, The Salvation Army’s claims process was not set down in writing or made publicly available, and so was neither transparent nor accessible. This was a barrier to survivors accessing their redress process. The information available now remains limited.
• The Salvation Army has not made information on redress available in formats accessible to Deaf and disabled survivors, such as New Zealand Sign Language and easy-read formats.
• The Salvation Army has not taken steps to proactively seek out survivors who were abused in their care.

Next: 2.5 Survivors’ experiences of State and faith redress processes