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Child safeguarding · Claim record

Because only men may serve as elders, all decisions in the organisation's internal process on whether child sexual abuse occurred are made by men; the Royal Commission called this 'a fundamental flaw' that 'increases the potential for further traumatisation of a survivor', and IICSA noted that some women 'may find it impossible to discuss such matters with a man'.

Claim ID claim-safeguarding-women-excluded-from-decisionsConcerns October 2016Independent finding
Independent finding · October 2016 Verified

Because only men may serve as elders, all decisions in the organisation's internal process on whether child sexual abuse occurred are made by men; the Royal Commission called this 'a fundamental flaw' that 'increases the potential for further traumatisation of a survivor', and IICSA noted that some women 'may find it impossible to discuss such matters with a man'. Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, October 2016Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), 2 September 2021

The organisation’s position or later explanation: Mr Jackson said decision-making 'is based on the headship principle... that Scripturally the men make the final decisions', but that two women close to a victim may take her testimony and convey it to elders ( p. 67). The current public policy says victims may be accompanied by 'a confidant of either gender' ( par. 12).

Show the evidence (2 sources)
Official public record Verified

Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, “Report of Case Study No. 29: The response of the Jehovah's Witnesses and Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of Australia Ltd to allegations of child sexual abuse”

October 2016 · pp.1-110 (ISBN 978-1-925289-89-3) · pp. 10-12, 14, 24-25, 58-70, 75-78 · The Hon. Justice Peter McClellan AM (Chair); Professor Helen Milroy (Commissioner) · Commonwealth of Australia

“Although the position is not clear in relation to a few files, there is otherwise no evidence before the Royal Commission of the Jehovah's Witness organisation having reported to police or other secular authority a single one of the 1,006 alleged perpetrators of child sexual abuse recorded in the case files held by Watchtower Australia.”

P. 60. Other key passages: p. 58 (files since 1950 record allegations against 1,006 members; 579 admissions; at least 1,800 alleged victims); p. 59 ('The numbers tell their own story'); p. 61 ('We are satisfied that it is the general practice of the Jehovah's Witness organisation in Australia not to report allegations of child sexual abuse to the police or other authorities unless required to do so by law'); p. 65 (two-witness rule: 'retention of and continued application of the rule to a complaint of child sexual abuse is wrong'); p. 67 (men-only decision-making is 'a fundamental flaw'); p. 69 ('places children within the organisation at significant risk'); p. 70 (BCG 'completely shunned, ostracised and actively avoided'); p. 77 ('We do not consider the Jehovah's Witness organisation to be an organisation which responds adequately to child sexual abuse').

Official source Scan of original Link not auto-checkable

Provenance and verification note

Confidence note. The official Royal Commission host could not be reached from this environment (TLS renegotiation failure / timeouts), so the NZ-hosted copy of the same Commonwealth publication was downloaded and text-extracted; all quotations verbatim with printed page numbers. Tabled in Parliament 28 November 2016.

Scan provenance. Copy of the Commonwealth publication (CC BY 3.0 AU) held in the New Zealand Abuse in Care Royal Commission evidence library; identical ISBN and pagination to the official release.

Corroborated by. src-wt-subs-2015-1109-royal-commission, src-arc-2015-0814-day155-transcript

Notes. Public hearing 27 July-5 August and 14 August 2015, Sydney. Survivors identified only as BCG and BCB. Also on parlinfo.aph.gov.au as a tabled paper.

Accessed. 19 September 2026 · Source ID. src-arc-2016-1000-cs29-report

Official public record Verified

Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), “Child protection in religious organisations and settings: Investigation Report”

2 September 2021 · pp.Part B para 15.4 (p. 15); Part D paras 19-21 (pp. 42-43); Part E paras 6.3-7 (pp. 65-66); Part F para 17 (pp. 91-92); Part H para 25 (p. 113) · Part H.1 para 25 · Professor Alexis Jay OBE (Chair) and Panel · Crown copyright (HC 705)

“The rule is not intended to be a safeguarding measure. Nevertheless, it has no place in any response to child sexual abuse and fails to reflect the reality that by its very nature child sexual abuse is most often perpetrated in the absence of witnesses. ... As it presently operates, the Jehovah's Witnesses internal disciplinary process for disfellowshipping members bears no relationship to how sexual crime happens. The continuing use of this rule shows a disregard of the seriousness of the crimes involved and their impact on individuals. It also lacks compassion for the victim, and serves to protect the perpetrator.”

Part H.1 Conclusions, para 25 (p. 113). Part B para 15.4: over 131,700 members in England and Wales; records showed allegations concerning 67 individuals reported to the Branch Office in the previous ten years, including 25 against elders and 32 against ministerial servants. Part D para 19 lists the four core policy documents (2018 public statement; Watchtower May 2019; Shepherd the Flock of God; Guidelines for Branch Office Service Desks) and notes that the two documents that explain how to refer matters to statutory authorities 'are not circulated to members of the congregation'. Part E para 6.4: the Service Department 'does not make reports to the statutory authorities'. Part E para 7: Lancashire County Council v E & F [2020] EWHC 182 (Fam) — elders told in 2016, police not informed until July 2019; Lieven J spoke of 'very great concern about the safeguarding of children within the Jehovah's Witness community'. Part F para 17: the Charity Commission's Harvey Grenville called the level of legal challenge 'simply unprecedented'.

Official source Scan of original

Provenance and verification note

Confidence note. gov.uk PDF downloaded and text-extracted; all quotations verbatim with printed page numbers. iicsa.org.uk HTML pages returned 403 to automated fetch.

Scan provenance. gov.uk copy of the report (224-page PDF). Printed page numbers are 14 lower than PDF page numbers.

Corroborated by. src-cc-2023-0804-watch-tower-inquiry-report

Notes. Published 2 September 2021 after 16 hearing days in 2020. IICSA made two recommendations (policy/training; unregistered educational settings); neither is JW-specific.

Accessed. 19 September 2026 · Source ID. src-iicsa-2021-0902-religious-organisations-report

Claim page

A direct link to this claim is https://jwtruth.org/evidence/claim-safeguarding-women-excluded-from-decisions/. Every source above opens the original document or the best available copy. If you believe the wording, date or context is wrong, report an error.