Attempts made to discredit safeguarding consultant's Scouting Ireland investigation
Attempts were made within Scouting Ireland to "discredit" the work of Ian Elliott in a bid to deflect from a recommendation that senior volunteers be held accountable for their actions.
In his
Read More:
"The following months were full of incident, some of which was stressful and challenging. Attempts were made to discredit my work as a way of deflecting attention away from my recommendation that senior volunteers should be held accountable for their actions," states the report.
Mr Elliott was referring to an incident in which confidential details about a report he conducted for Scouting Ireland into how an alleged rape claim was handled were leaked to the media.
He said that this "made working with the Board extremely difficult".
"The Board were written to outlining the difficulties that these breaches of confidentiality created. This led to contact with the Board being limited, up until Oct 2018, by the fact that leaks regularly continued, and no one knew who was responsible for it," states the report.
Mr Elliott states that the letters, which are included in the report, were written after he realised that his conversations with the Board "were being recorded without my knowledge or permission, and shared with journalists".
In the first letter, from February 2018, Mr Elliott informs the Board that the leaks had caused him "considerable reputational damage".
The leak has made it impossible for me to repeat open communication with you on the sensitive and challenging issues that we have previously discussed.
"As I do not know who to trust, I must assume that any contact we have will require that all identities I refer to, will be redacted."
"Change in an organisation is always difficult to achieve but it is so much more difficult when you are constantly at risk of having your work profiled in the media. This is not what I would have wanted but it has been forced upon me by some person or persons amongst you," said the letter.
Following a further leak, Mr Elliott again wrote to the Board in Apr of 2018 stating that he would not allow his work to be "unfairly criticised or undermined to suit the hidden agenda of a small minority of individuals who operate without any moral code and are totally focused on their own situation".
"For many months, I have been greatly exercised by the lack of accountability that exists in Scouting Ireland for misconduct.
"You appear to hold to the view that failing to disclose relevant facts to an inquiry, for example, is not a matter for resigning. I wonder what is!"
"You simply cannot operate on the basis that you are above any moral code. You are not. Accountability is your responsibility.
"It is not mine and I would respectfully suggest that you turn your attention to considering how you are going to hold people accountable for the misconduct that has already taken place," said the letter.
'Historical Sexual Abuse in Scouting: A Learning Review': Recommendations
1. The governance structure of Scouting Ireland should ensure that small, undemocratic cliques of members do not exert undue influence on the decision making of the organisation.
2. A robust disciplinary process should be adopted that will hold volunteers accountable where it has been found that their behaviour is unacceptable or contravenes expectations of how an adult volunteer should behave.
3. Records should be created that reflect the safeguarding practice of the organisation fairly and comprehensively. They should be centrally stored, regularly monitored, and capable of being retrieved easily. The practice of holding documentation or electronic information outside of the approved central database, should be ended immediately.
4. The Board should be regularly updated on the overall safeguarding workload that exists, at any time, in Scouting Ireland. This information, when presented by the safeguarding manager, should be interrogated by the directors to satisfy themselves that appropriate responses were made to all the safeguarding concerns that emerged.
5. A diligent attempt should be made to establish what documentation exists outside of the official records system, currently. Home visits should be made to make it as easy as possible for anyone to return documentation
6. Scouting Ireland should make an institutional apology to all those harmed through their contact with scouting in previous years.
7. Effective safeguarding must be adequately resourced and prioritised.
8. Where it has been shown that an individual, regardless of their position, placed a young person at risk through their actions, or brought dishonour to the scouting movement, they should be expelled directly.
9. Where risk has been identified as existing, this information should be shared with all people that need to be informed.
10. Scouting Ireland should set up an independent audit process monitoring the quality of its safeguarding practice. It should be undertaken annually or no less frequently than every two years.
11. Scouting Ireland should continue to maintain and nurture a close working relationship with the key safeguarding statutory agencies here.
12. Scouting Ireland should deter any use of social media to distribute unsubstantiated allegations and to encourage the spread of cronyism. Any breach of this, should be subject to Scouting Ireland disciplinary processes.
