A SIGNIFICANT "difference in understanding" over who commissioned the report by the National Board for Safeguarding Children (NBSC) in the Catholic Church in Ireland, on child protection practices in Cloyne diocese, appears to have delayed its publication by months.
This "difference in understanding" was how NBSC chief executive Ian Elliott described the situation in a letter to the office of the Minister for Children Barry Andrews on September 9th last. He was replying to a September 3rd letter from that office which said it had not commissioned the report.
In the report published last Friday, Mr Elliott said that on February 15th last he met two senior officials from "the Department of Health and Children" to update them on initiatives the board was taking where best practice for safeguarding children in the church was concerned.
He was informed "a complaint had been made to the Minister regarding the practice of the diocese of Cloyne in a particular case". A copy of the correspondence was given to him and he was "asked to investigate the circumstances outlined in the complaint, and to report back his findings".
Yesterday Mr Elliott repeated: "That is my understanding of what happened and I am holding to it."
Last night Mr Andrews said: "Neither I, nor any official in the office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, commissioned or directed the NBSC to carry out an investigation into the diocese of Cloyne. The NBSC was informed that a complaint had been made on September 25th, 2007, that the HSE had been notified on October 8th, 2007, and that the HSE had been asked to prepare a report for the Minister.
"The State could not instruct nor commission an agency of the Catholic Church (even though independent of the Catholic Church) to carry out an internal review," but that "when I became aware that the NBSC was not prepared to forward its report to the HSE, my officials forwarded the NBSC report to the HSE."
According to a chronology of events supplied by the Minister's office last night, Mr Elliott was advised repeatedly by it in correspondence between February and May last that he should be "liaising with the HSE in relation to child protection concerns".
On July 10th, following receipt of the NBSC report, it wrote to Mr Elliott again "clarifying roles and responsibilities . . . and reminding him of the need for direct contact with HSE in respect of any report of an investigation into child protection issues".
On July 28th, Mr Elliott told them he had no mandate from his board to present his report to the HSE and on August 7th he wrote to the HSE rejecting its requests for the report. On August 15th the report was forwarded to the HSE by the Minister's office. On August 18th Mr Elliott wrote to the office saying it had commissioned the NBSC report, and that the NBSC had received legal advice to deliver the report to that office only. But he said they had no problem with them forwarding a copy to the HSE.
Responding on September 3rd, the office reaffirmed it had not commissioned the NBSC investigation and report, but had made him aware of the Cloyne complaint to allow him work with the HSE.
In his September 9th letter responding, Mr Elliott referred to their "difference in understanding." It rested there until Wednesday last when Cork East Labour TD Seán Sherlock called on the Minister to publish the NBSC report.
Mr Andrews said that, as the report was not commissioned by the Government, responsibility for publication lay with the NBSC. Mr Elliott responded "given that the Minister has made it clear that this report is clearly ours, we are considering all options available to us". The report was published by Cloyne diocese last Friday.
In a strongly-worded letter to The Irish Times today, Fr Patrick McCafferty, a curate at Rathmines in Dublin, said Bishop Magee "should have the decency to resign".
