by Helena Rameckers

Saturday 16th November 2024 saw over 250 delegates from parishes, religious congregations and lay organisations gather at Strathclyde University’s Technology and Innovation Centre in Glasgow for the third annual National Safeguarding Conference held by the Scottish Catholic Safeguarding Standards Agency (SCSSA).

The delegates spent a day networking and focusing on the theme ‘Preventing Abuse in Faith Organisations’. This year’s theme signified a move from reactive safeguarding messaging to a more proactive approach to keeping all people safe in our communities, thereby helping to foster what Pope Francis calls a ‘continuous and profound conversion of hearts’.

The keynote (https://www.scssa.org.uk/Learning/National-Safeguarding-Conference-2024) was provided by Stuart Allardyce of the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, UK charity that provides advice, services, projects, research and advocacy to stop child sexual abuse and harmful sexual behaviour (lucyfaithfull.org.uk). Stuart reminded delegates that only one in eight victims of sexual abuse come to the attention of the authorities at the time of the abuse, and asked the challenging question ‘If we are courageous, patient and prayerful as a body and willing to act, could the Church …take social leadership in tackling child sexual abuse? And what if that also included doing everything we can to prevent abuse before it happened?’

Stuart highlighted work being carried out by his organisation to prevent abuse. Delegates welcomed his evidence based, objective, yet challenging approach, with one delegate remarking that the ‘keynote address was … relevant, appropriate and took the whole safeguarding conversation up a couple of levels’. Stuart concluded with an invitation to the Catholic Church in Scotland to work alongside the Lucy Faithfull Foundation to develop demonstrably effective prevention practices for faith communities – work which the SCSSA is committed to supporting.

Online safety

After lunch, delegates were able to attend two of four ‘taster’ sessions.  Detective Constable Kasia Owczarek from Police Scotland delivered a well-received session on Online Safety, in which she shared practical information about online safety. She told attendees that 3.6 million internet users simply use the word ‘password’ to protect their online accounts, while a staggering 23.2 million people use ‘123456’. She played the sobering video ‘A Message from Ella: Without Consent’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4WZ_k0vUDM&t=4s)) to demonstrate what ill-intentioned people can do with our online activities. Kasia reinforced the message that a child never consents to online abuse yet has to live with the impact and gave practical tips for helping to keep children safe online.

A second session, entitled ‘Safe Words’, was led by Lesley Anne Pratchett of Break the Silence – a charity that supports survivors of sexual abuse. Lesley Anne’s presentation sought to emphasise that talking about abuse makes everyone safer. Referencing a wide range of church documents and secular sources, she took delegates on a journey through current safeguarding issues in our own communities and the lies we can often tell ourselves about abuse not happening where we are. She discussed why people didn’t speak out about the abuse crisis in the Church, what our preconceived biases may be, and what a cultural revolution might look like to achieve a culture of care.

A third session, entitled ‘Safe Spaces’ was delivered by members of Diocesan Safeguarding Teams. It aimed to reinforce what In God’s Image – the document that governs safeguarding in the Catholic Church in Scotland – requires of parishes to ensure that our physical environments are places where people can be safe from abuse. Attendees were given scenarios to discuss in groups.

Finally, the Moira Anderson Foundation delivered an introduction to their ‘Safe Hands’ training course, which seeks to help children identify and express when they are feeling unsafe.

Helena Rameckers is Head of Safeguarding Training at the Scottish Catholic Safeguarding Standards Agency.