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	Public Inquiries and the Protection of Children Orleans Star January 9, 2008 http://www.eastottawa.ca/blog_sujet.php?noBlog=713 The National news is filled with murders and rich men taking money that doesn't belong to them. Sports figures are cheating the system by using drugs that enhance their performance. A four year old child is molested by her father for the pleasure of a paedophile who lives many miles away. The father gets caught and receives a four year prison term, one year for each year of this young girl's unprotected precious life. Canada has a sorry history of human rights violations in its institutions. The atrocities perpetrated on our First Nations children are now an accepted part of history. After decades of ignoring and minimizing the issue they were finally given compensation this year. Money for a lost heritage and childhood that can never be replaced. The children of Mount Cashel, the Duplesse Orphans and the thousands or children who today are in our child welfare system because of abuse and neglect are a picture we don't want to see too clearly. No institution is sacred and we hear reports of abuse in our National Ballet School, in our churches and within our sports institutions. We will sit down during the holidays and try to believe that charities managed to get a turkey and gifts to every child living in an impoverished home. We will try not to think about the many children in Canada who have no home, no safety and no love. When all the mental health professionals get together and try to understand what makes people do such horrible things to children, they come up with many theories. Is it in the brain, or the upbringing? We do know that it seems impossible to give someone a conscience. Currently in Cornwall Ontario there is an ongoing public inquiry that is looking to find the truth about decades old allegations of abuse against children by many people who worked for various institutions in that city. In September of 1993, a Cornwall Police Officer named Perry Dunlop discovered that no one was going to do anything about abuse that was being allegedly perpetrated by a local Catholic priest. He did what he could. He reported the allegations to the local child welfare authorities. He lost his job for obeying provincial laws that mandate the reporting of child abuse allegations. Eventually Perry got his job back but the harassment became too much and he moved his family to the other side of the country. Now the Inquiry wants to jail Perry Dunlop because he refuses to testify in a process he feels will not find the truth. He has offered to read into testimony a 400 page document that was prepared closer to the time the events occurred. A document he feels would be more accurate than his memory. Dunlop's offer was not accepted resulting in him being convicted of obstruction of justice and ordered to appear before the Inquiry to testify.Not one other person including the many accused are being forced to testify and answer questions - only Perry Dunlop. Many, like Perry Dunlop, believe the system is broken and doesn't protect victims of sexual crimes. More believe that institutions will protect themselves and the status quo. Our Public Inquiry system is an adversarial process. Involved parties can be granted standing, have legal representation and are able to cross examine witnesses. Witnesses must talk about the most private of matters in an open court, filled with reporters and telecast over the internet. Institutions are notoriously self protective and have deep pockets and high priced lawyers. They and their insurance companies are particularly reluctant to accept responsibility when things go wrong. The current Canadian public inquiry system is a flawed system. Until it is taken to task, it is a system that will never arrive at the truth in circumstances such as these. If you were a victim of sexual crime would you be willing to go into a public arena, discuss the intimate details of your assault, your mental health and then agree to be cross examined by the lawyers who may represent the people and institutions involved in your abuse? This is what the Cornwall Inquiry asks of all of those who will testify before it. Many will chose not to be put through this process and without that testimony we will not get to the truth. Forcing those to testify in a broken system; all the while pretending that the system is effective, is wrong. Across the border, they have a different system. When wrong doing needs to be looked into they convene a Grand Jury. The focus of a Grand Jury is to get to the truth. Witnesses are interviewed and questioned in private before a jury convened for this purpose. The jury then determines whether evidence warrants charges and they produce a report and recommendations. This becomes part of the public record. While no system is perfect, Grand Juries in the U.S. have managed to get at the truth in cases of abuse that have involved large institutions in such places as Boston and Philadelphia. Edmund Burke said that "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing". When one quarter of our nation's children will experience sexual abuse before the age of eighteen, we have a public health crisis on our hands. We need systems that will protect them when caregivers fail. We need other systems to oversee that things are as they should be. When institutions fail to protect our children we need good people to speak out. Perry Dunlop did the right thing by doing what he could to ensure the system did its job to protect children. If we do not change our system of investigating these wrongs we will never get at the truth and be able to take corrective action. We need to stop convicting whistleblowers and we need to change our Public Inquiry system.
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