The CSSA confirms safeguarding audit judgements on five religious life groups
6 October 2025
In the first audit of their safeguarding practice today, five religious life groups have been judged by the Catholic Safeguarding Standards Agency (CSSA) with the following grades:
English Dominican Congregation of St Catherine of Siena – Early Progress
Handmaids of the Holy Child Jesus – Met with Recommendations
Sisters of Mercy Sunderland – Firm Progress
Society of Mary Marist Fathers – Results Being Achieved
Vincentians Divine Retreat Centres – Early Progress
The Inspectorate for England and Wales report that these religious life groups demonstrate varying progress towards the eight national safeguarding standards. They offered different levels of evidence to independent analysts from within the CSSA about how they help keep people safe.
Steve Ashley, Chief Executive Officer, CSSA said: “These baseline results show varying levels of safeguarding in the five church bodies.
“Each religious life group must either sustain its progress or in some cases make significant improvement. Only this way can they assure the public that everything possible is being done to help prevent harm.”
CSSA safeguarding audits for larger religious life groups range on a scale from: ‘below basic,’ ‘basic,’ ‘early progress,’ ‘firm progress,’ ‘comprehensive assurance’ and ‘exemplary.’
For smaller religious life groups, grades range from: ‘not met,’ ‘met with recommendations’ and ‘met.’ In each case, the overall grading represents a combination of their scoring across eight areas of work relating to safeguarding standards.
The CSSA publish the safeguarding audit and inspection results from every Catholic diocese, religious life group and eparchy in England and Wales. You can find the audits for religious life groups HERE.
ENDS
More information about the CSSA’s audit and inspection process can be found HERE
Journalists: to speak with a spokesperson from the CSSA, please initially contact Sarah Gleadall: sarah.gleadall@catholicsafeguarding.org.uk