New abuse law won’t apply to Con­fes­sion

by Tony Whitfield, Sunday Express

VICARS and priests who hear about child sex abuse dur­ing Con­fes­sion will not have a duty to report it under new laws com­ing into force next year.

The Crime and Poli­cing Act intro­duces a man­dat­ory report­ing oblig­a­tion to those work­ing or volun­teer­ing with chil­dren in faith set­tings.

While the Home Office said “there will be no excep­tions based on reli­gious prac­tices”, the seal of Con­fes­sion will not be covered.

The seal is the priest’s oblig­a­tion under canon law to hear a per­son’s Con­fes­sion in com­plete con­fid­ence.they can­not repeat or dis­close what is said.

Tra­di­tion­al­ists called for this to be main­tained, while man­dat­ory report­ing without reli­gious excep­tion was one of the key recom­mend­a­tions in the final report of the Inde­pend­ent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse in 2022.

Bishop Robert Sprin­gett, lead for safe­guard­ing, told the Gen­eral Synod last month it was “clear that Con­fes­sion is not a ‘reg­u­lated activ­ity’ as defined by the newly passed Police and Crime Act, and so the respons­ib­il­ity is firmly in our court”. He said he was “acutely aware that the con­tin­ued use of the seal is seen by many as fatally under­min­ing our cred­ib­il­ity in our com­mit­ment to man­dat­ory report­ing, indeed it under­mines the view for many of the sin­cer­ity of our com­mit­ment to safe­guard­ing itself”.

Read here