Has Nolan failed? The Catholic Church in England and Wales invested a huge amount of energy in implementing the recommendations of a commission set up under Lord Nolan in 2000. Its purpose was to make the Catholic Church a safe environment for children, after horrific cases of child sexual abuse by priests had come to light. The right words and intentions were never lacking, but the results are a different matter.

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), a statutory inquiry, heard evidence last week that was deeply disappointing and disturbing. The Church still does not know how to treat victims and survivors. Many see it as an accomplice in their initial abuse when they were young, and then as perpetrator of secondary abuse in adulthood by the dismissive way they were treated. The Church injured them, and if there is justice in the world it must be the Church that binds their wounds, not inflicts more pain.

The essence of all child safeguarding good practice, including under Nolan and the subsequent Cumberlege report, is the paramountcy principle, as in the Children Act of 1989: that the welfare of the child takes precedence over all other considerations. That ought to apply to adult victims who come forward long after the childhood abuse stopped. The Church has officially accepted that principle, but has fallen a long way short in practice. Some dioceses are better than others, but two have emerged as particularly problematic – the Archdiocese of Birmingham and the Archdiocese of Westminster.