A FRAMEWORK has been published to guide victims and survivors of abuse, as well as church bodies, who are involved in making safeguarding changes in the Church.

The National Survivor Participation Framework was approved by the National Safeguarding Steering Group (NSSG) on 25 November, and was published on the Church of England website on Thursday of last week. It will be revised by the NSSG in November 2026.

The framework came about in 2018 as a result of the General Synod’s recognising “survivor engagement as a key priority for action”, a Church House statement says. This resulted in the National Safeguarding Team’s establishing a strategy to design “a framework for the participation of victims and victims and survivors to support the work of the Church to improve its safeguarding responses and practices”.

A report of the findings of a survey of 171 victims and survivors, published in October 2023, found that they wanted to influence decision-making about how the Church can be made a safer environment (News, 20 October 2023).

The framework includes six principles “to enable Church bodies and church officers who want to actively and well involve victims and survivors in the safeguarding work of the Church”.

They are: “Creating meaningful and person-centred participation for victims and survivors in safeguarding in ways that prevents further harm and re-traumatisation”; “Enabling well-informed choices for individuals when considering whether to participate and throughout their involvement”; “Facilitating inclusive spaces where there is not ‘us and them’, where all individuals and opinions are respected and treated equally”; “Ensuring that all voices and experiences of victims and survivors can be heard and influence safeguarding development decisions”; “Using task-focused approaches that deliver outcomes and make an impact on keeping people safe”; and “Committing to appropriately resourced, open, transparent and ongoing survivor participation in safeguarding”.