After Savile: No More Secrets? Panorama

Tonight Panorama investigates allegations that schools and

hospitals failed to investigate serious child abuse. I was so angry

that the school had got legal advice on whether they needed to report a

paedophile. Secret Government files showed how paedophiles were able to

move freely between institutions, putting children in danger. He

should have been stopped at that stage. Had he been stopped, other

boys would not have been abused in the way that they were. Following

the Jimmy Savile abuses, there are calls for changes in the law. People

should not feel scared of speaking out and helping another human being.

And now the former Director of Public Prosecutions says that those

that do not report abuse should face jail. I think the time has come to

change the law and close a gap that has been there for a very long time.

Two years ago, Rob Hastings's life was turned upside down by a phone

call out of the blue asking him about his school days. The phone

call was from Avon and Somerset police. Did you go to Downside? It

was all he had to say. He did not have to say any more. Just that one

sentence fundamentally has changed my life. And brought back a part of

my life that I really could do without. This is Downside School

near Bath where Rob Hastings was sexually abused by a teacher. It is

one of the oldest and most prestigious Catholic boarding

schools in the country. When Rob arrived here aged 11, he was ordered

by the grandeur of the school. -- in all of the grandeur. The scale of it

was quite intimidating and I was impressed. I enjoyed being there to

begin with. I quite liked it. However, within a few weeks of

arriving, Rob had been targeted by his geography master, Father

Nicholas, who used his interest in ancient manuscripts to groom him.

Conveniently for him, there was a whole bunch of ancient books in the

library and from there he progressed his interest in me, tried his luck,

and progressed it further and further. Did you object to it at any

point? I think this is one of the things that really upsets me now.

When it all broke out, I was proud. Proud? Proud. How so? I had special

attention from this monk, someone that we all looked up to. Father

Nicholas groomed and then abused Rob for year and a half. It was only

discovered because other boys complained that he was apparently

getting special privileges. He would award me with money. 50p was what I

remember. He gave me access to the tuck shop when other people were not

around. Remember that some kid in the prep school asked me why I had

different suites from them. I proudly said that I had got this

monk in my pocket. Aren't I clever? Rob was summoned to a meeting at the

school where he was cross-examined. I remember there was a huge amount

of pressure on me that because of my dyslexia I misunderstood the

relationship, I was wrong, it did not happen and I was simply, for

want of another word, being stupid. Rob was removed from his school by

the parents. The police were never called. For 20 years, Rob heard

nothing more. Police only found evidence that Rob had been abused

because they were trawling through the school's old records

investigating another complaint. Astonishingly, it turned out that

between the late 1960s and the early 2000s, six monks had sexually

assaulted children or viewed images of child abuse. In January last

year, Rob's abuser Father Nicholas, real name Richard White, was jailed

for five years. At the trial, Rob discovered two things. The first was

that Richard White had abused another boy a year earlier. Although

he had confessed, the school kept it secret. The second thing was that

the school had written to their lawyers, asking if they had a legal

obligation to report Richard White to the police. This letter came. I

was shocked. It shocked me absolutely to my core. I can't tell

you. I was in floods of tears. I was so upset, so angry that the school

had gone and got legal advice on whether they needed to report a

paedophile. I personally could have been saved.

The lawyers said the school did not need to go to the police, so instead

Richard White was quietly moved to an abbey in Scotland, away from

children. The current headmaster of Downside didn't want to be

interviewed but told Panorama in a statement: Neither I nor the school

would today follow the steps taken more than 20 years ago. Such a

matter would be reported by the school to the police and other

relevant authorities as appropriate. So what is it about our system that

allowed this to happen and could it still happened today? Ever since the

revelations about Jimmy Savile, I have been investigating the secret

historical record looking at what Government officials knew about

abuse in children's homes and boarding schools. I have unearthed

declassified Government files going back to the 1950s. What they show is

that more than 60 years ago senior civil servants recognised that

school authorities routinely his child abuse, preferring instead to

protect the reputation of their own institutions. One of the most

detailed files is about a cover-up at this school, the Royal Alexandra

and Albert. Today it is a well-regarded state boarding school

set amongst the grounds of Gatton Park in Reigate, Surrey.

Founded 250 years ago, the Royal Alexandra and Albert was originally

an orphanage, albeit one whose patron was the monarch and where

visits from royalty were and are a regular treat. However, research by

Panorama has revealed that seven child abusers worked here between

the 1950s and 1980s. What went wrong here in the past, some say, makes

the case for a change in the law today. One of the files we found

deals with events here in 1950. This declassified document comes from the

National Archives. What it shows is how one of the most junior members

of staff tried hard to bring a paedophile to justice and how the

school authorities tried to bury the evidence that she collected. It all

began when the assistant matron overheard some boys talking about

that old housemaster, saying that he had sexually assaulted them. From

their verbal remarks, it appeared that these things had gone on for a

long time and involved a considerable number of boys. She

also discovered that two boys had previously complained to the

headmaster. It was a clear pattern of abuse but alleged abuser had

moved onto another job the Barnardos home. Until last week, Keir Starmer

was that Director of Public Prosecutions for England and Wales.

I showed him the files. It is a deeply troubling story because on

the face of it you have junior staff recognising something is wrong and

others in a position of authority equally intent on doing nothing

about it. The documents reveal that the assistant matron went straight

to the governors because she knew that previous incidents had been

hushed up by the headmaster. She took her story to one of the senior

school governors at his home. Months past, but nothing was done. The

assistant matron had kept copies of the boys' statements and later

showed them to another member of staff. He called in the police.

Confronted by police officers at the Barnardos home where he now worked,

the housemaster confessed to assaulting and raping boys both here

and at the Barnardos home. It was at this point that the home office

became involved. In the files is a 62-year-old letter from a senior

civil servant in the Home Office to the then Director of Public

Prosecutions. It looks as though the governors, having acknowledged there

was primer face the evidence of criminal offences, decided to keep

quiet, not to involve the police. -- rumour . The chief prosecutor

refused to tell the police. There is no criminal offence with which they

can be charged and therefore no sanction to report a homily from me.

When we look at these files, the difficulty, the DPP said, that there

is no criminal offence with which they can be charged, means they had

not broken the law. Would they have now? The position has not really

changed. On the narrow view taken in 1951, no offence for failing to

report, that is the position now. With no compulsion to report abuse,

paedophiles were able to move around the system and children at the Royal

Alexandra and other residential schools were exposed to abuse again

and again. This man is Allen Meredith, housemaster at the Royal

Alexandra School in the 1980s, responsible for children's welfare.

We have disguised his appearance. We tracked down Allen Meredith. He

didn't want to be interviewed on camera but he told us that he had

started abusing boys soon after arriving at the school. He said

parents complained in 1983 and 1984 but the police were never called. It

was only when a parent went directly to the police in 1985 that Allen

Meredith was interviewed. Detective Inspector Alec Love later prosecuted

Meredith, found evidence of repeated complaints against him at the Royal

Alexandra school, and they were not passed to the police at the time.

The reality is that he should have been stopped at that stage. If he

had been stopped, other boys would not have been abused in the way that

they were. We asked the former headmaster about complaints against

Meredith. He said he was aware of just one, when a parent went to the

police. He had suspended Meredith but reinstated him when no charges

were brought. Meredith was told not to be on his own with children. When

he did not comply, he was sacked. Four years later, in 1989, Meredith

was able to get the new job at another state boarding school. The

Royal Caledonian in Hertfordshire is now closed. But if there were

previously such serious concerns about Allen Meredith, what puzzled

police was why that information was not shared. My understanding was

that there was no mention and quite honestly I would be astounded if the

Royal Caledonian had employed him if mention had been made of it. I asked

Allen Meredith if he had started abusing boys at the Royal Caledonian

school as soon as he arrived. Oh, no, he said. I had to groom them

first. He said he abused boys between 1990 and 1994. Again he said

there were complaints to the school and again the police were not

called. It was only when a parent went directly to the police that

Allen Meredith was interviewed. That was in 1995. Meredith confessed and

was sentenced to ten years in prison for his crimes. I would say that

they were at the top level of serious abuse. Basically the rape of

boys who were 11. I don't think you can get much worse than that.

Strikingly, Allen Meredith told me he wished he had been caught

earlier. He said it would have saved a lot of victims and helped him sort

his life out. Paedophilia, he said, is like a disease and it needs

really intensive treatment to deal with it. Allen Meredith tells us

that while in prison he had intensive treatment for paedophilia

and there is no record of any further offences since he left

prison in 2001. But Alec Love was outraged that there had been

complaints is about Meredith at both schools. He wanted to bring

prosecutions for failing to stop Meredith's abuse. In the end, no

case could be made against the Royal Alexandra. The prosecution against

the head and deputy of the Royal Caledonian for wilful neglect was

thrown out by the judge. I can see why, in that particular case, wilful

neglect was tried. The problem is, if you haven't got a central

provision requiring people to report, all you can do is fall back

on other provisions that are not really designed for that purpose.

That usually means they run into difficulties. What you really need

is a clear, direct law that everybody understands. Failing to

report abusers to the police is still a problem today. At Hillside

First School, in Somerset, staff had been raising concerns about a

teacher, Nigel Leat, since 1999. Concerns that then headmaster had

ignored. Tell us how it was you managed to keep those children

silent. In 2011, he was jailed indefinitely after admitting 36

sexual offences, including the rape of young children. The school was

renamed and put under new management. This is not something

confined to the past, is it? There was the recent case of Nigel Leat.

This is a very real issue that has been with us for a very long time.

We can go back to the 50s and probably earlier to find examples,

but we can find more recent examples. It is a simple

proposition. If you are in a position of authority and you have

cause to believe that a child has been abused, you really ought to do

something about it. Because the headteacher, Chris Hood, did not do

enough to stop Nigel Leat, in April this year he was banned from

teaching for life. Professor Eileen Munro is the author

of an influential report for the government on child protection. I

asked her if the case of Nigel Leat demonstrated the need for criminal

prosecutions. That is not true, you are saying there is no prosecution

case but there is a sanction in terms of you have been

professionally irresponsible. Whatever agency you are working in,

you have failed to meet the responsibilities of that Agency

under the strategic guidance. In Ireland they are bringing their law

into line with Canada, benighted state and Australia. Soon, reporting

suspicions of child abuse will be mandatory. That means that

professionals working with children will be required by law to report

suspected cases of child sexual abuse, or CSA, as it is sometimes

known. Does introducing mandatory reporting increase reporting of CSA?

I would say yes. First of all, it has been shown that he will find

more cases of very severe child abuse and neglect then a system

without mandated reporting well. I think the figures are sufficiently

clear about that, over time. You will identify more cases of severe

abuse and neglect. You are changing those children's prospects in life

for ever. The British government does not want a mandatory reporting

law for England and Wales. No one from the responsible department,

Education, was available, but they issued this statement. Mandatory

reporting is not the answer. They say many thousands of cases of abuse

are reported every year. And numbers of referrals have increased over

recent years. We recognise, however, that sometimes professionals do not

refer a child when they should do so. Addressing this is a priority.

Other countries have tried mandatory reporting and there was no evidence

to show it is a better system for protecting children. In fact, there

is evidence to show it can make children less safe. Ben Matthews's

work was cited by the Department for Education as evidence of why

mandatory reporting could make children less safe. He does not

accept that. Nor does he agree with other critics, who say that

mandatory reporting would generate an overwhelming flood of reports. If

you introduce mandatory reporting, at least in the short term, the

evidence does indicate, as you would expect, an increase in the number of

reports. An absolute prerequisite for a healthy system is that

mandated reporters have excellent educational training about the

nature of reporting, so that they can report cases that should be

reported and avoid making clearly unnecessary reports. When it comes

to protecting children in institutions, the focus has recently

become much broader. Organisations like the BBC and the Health Service

now face serious allegations that they did not do enough in the past

to protect children. This is Stoke Mandeville Hospital in

Buckinghamshire. In 1977, a 12-year-old girl was on one of the

wards here. She told us she was raped while recovering from an

operation to have her tonsils out. She has asked us to conceal their

identity. I was bored because I was in an old peoples ward. I asked the

nurse if I could go and watch television. She said I could go to

the television room. I came out of the water and there was a porter.

You seemed very nice. He asked me where I was going. I could not speak

properly, but I said I was going to the TV room. He said he would show

me where it. Celia says that the porter Tucker into the empty

television room and raped her. -- tucked her. You told the nurse

absolutely what had happened? I said the porter had hurt me, down here.

She said? Don't say anything, she will get in trouble. Do you think

she knew the kind of thing he was doing? She knew. The reason the

nurse told her to keep quiet about the attack was because the porter

was not a porter at all. He was Jimmy Savile, now accused of assault

in 30 hospitals. People may feel they know about Jimmy Savile in the

NHS, but do they? I don't think they do, I don't think they know half of

it. The evidence I am still hearing from our clients is truly shocking.

Shocking in the sense of the nature of the assaults that he carried out

and also shocking that people reported it, clearly reported that,

and that it was not passed on and nothing was done. The Jimmy Savile

scandal has given many survivors of abuse the courage to come forward

and make a fresh reports. What upsets many victims is that they

were not listened to at the time. The Government need to step up, they

need to open the doors properly so that people are able to speak out,

and they don't lose their jobs, they don't feel scared of helping another

human being. Celia's lawyer believes if there had been a mandatory

reporting law, details of Jimmy Savile's abuse could have been

reported to the police as early as 1964. Scores of victims could have

been saved. Stoke Mandeville Hospital say they are unable to

comment while the NHS inquiry into Savile's abuse continues. Some of

the institutions were abuse and cover-up have been rife, and the

Catholic Church, are now calling for a change in the law. I would have no

problem with mandatory reporting, because, in a sense, we follow that

principle. I think it would be a healthy and right thing to do,

because it would make a paramount the needs and rights of the victim.

So, a very clear message to victims from society saying, if you have

been abused, come forward and this is what we will do, and this is what

people are required to do. The Church of England has also had its

share of scandals. The Archbishop of Canterbury has condemned the Church

of England in Sussex for its appalling record in handling

allegations of sexual abuse by priests

idea for institutions across the country. There is a whole range of

reasons why people have not been doing it. They worry about how they

will be viewed. They are concerned that they will be misunderstood. Or

they simply think, I don't want to get involved. I'm worried if I get

involved. But we have to think of the child first. Not ourselves, not

the institution. What is best for the child. I have spoken to

charities concerned with child welfare. Some believe a new law

should be considered, while others believe it could undermine child

protection systems. They fear it could divert precious time and

resources and that it will solve the problem of institutional cover-ups.

I don't see any evidence it would make a difference. Taking the

Catholic Church as an example that has occurred in countries with

mandate we reporting, I know of no criminal prosecution of a Bishop for

failing to act upon information that a priest was being abusive. You

don't think a criminal sanction would make any difference? I don't

see that it has had that effect in other countries. The kind of

institutional pressures that make people try and cover problems are

not solved by mandate we reporting. As Director of Public Prosecutions,

Keir Starmer has tried to improve the way that victims of abuse are

treated by the criminal justice system. He sees mandatory reporting

as the next step. I think it is time for a change in the law. I think

there should be a mandatory reporting provision. I have spent

quite a lot of time trying to think how the criminal justice system can

improve its response to child sexual abuse. I went to Washington to see

how the specialist teams their deal with it. They do have a mandatory

reporting scheme. It is very straightforward, a simple scheme. I

think something like that could work in this country. Now is the time to

plug a gap that has been there for a very, very long time. While the

Department for Education say they will continue to examine the

evidence, victims are calling for action now. I personally feel, given

the situation at the moment, that our children are just as vulnerable

as they were. We know so much more about abuse now than we did. Our

failure to act is simply a statement saying we don't care. That is

morally wrong. We should not allow it to happen.

Next week, as the latest property boom prices more families out of

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debt fuelled house price bubble. A family memoir that captured

the hearts of millions. A potter telling stories

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