AUSTRALIA
The Age
[Royal Commission calls for submissions on ‘Towards Healing’ – Lateline]
August 9, 2013
Benjamin Millar
The Catholic Church’s insurance company destroyed records relating to sexual abuse and drove the church’s handling of victims of abuse, according to a former adviser to the church.
Psychologist Dr Robert Grant, who advised the Catholic Church committee dealing with sexual abuse, told ABC’s Lateline on Thursday that Catholic Church Insurance dictated how victims should be treated under the Towards Healing protocol, a claim CCI denies.
US-based Dr Grant said meetings he attended in the late 1990s with the National Committee for Professional Standards, which was drafting the Towards Healing document, were attended by senior representatives of church-owned CCI or their lawyers.
Dr Grant, who has worked with the Catholic Church on sexual abuse in seven countries, said discussions devising the Towards Healing protocols centred on church liability and priests “being unjustly accused” rather than the wellbeing of victims.
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