Archbishop Pell Reacts to Abuse Inquiry

ABC - 7.30
November 13, 2012

http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2012/s3632078.htm

[with video]

Archbishop of Sydney George Pell says the media have campaigned against the Catholic Church but says the church will cooperate with the Government's Royal Commission into child abuse within institutions.

LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: A day after the Government announced a royal commission into child sex abuse, the Catholic Archbishop George Pell has defended his institution's handling of such matters. Cardinal Pell believes there's a persistent press campaign against the Catholic Church and he objects to his organisation being singled out. He also says the Church's association with sex abuse is, at times, exaggerated. In a press conference today the Archbishop said he would fully cooperate with the Commonwealth investigation as a way to bring to an end decades of damage to the Church's reputation and to deliver justice to victims. Cardinal Pell has been dogged by this issue for much of his leadership in the Catholic Church.

The day after the Government called a royal commission, Cardinal Pell finally agreed to answer questions about what has led to it.

GEORGE PELL, CATHOLIC ARCHBISHOP OF SYDNEY: We object to it being exaggerated, we object to being described as the "only cab on the rank", we acknowledge - with shame - the extent of the problem. One of the reasons why we welcome the royal commission is that this commission will enable those claims to be validated... or found to be a significant exaggeration.

LEIGH SALES: George Pell's history with the child sex abuse issue goes back decades. In the early 90s, in the Victorian town of Ballarat, one of the Catholic Church's most infamous paedophile scandals was unfolding. The perpetrator, Father Gerald Ridsdale, abused as many as 200 children over 20 years, while his superiors did nothing to stop him.

STEPHEN WOODS, MOLESTATION VICTIM: I went to see a priest at the local parish, and it was Father Ridsdale, and within half an hour he had me up at the toilet [inaudible] and was raping me.

LEIGH SALES: When Ridsdale went to court to plead guilty, George Pell, then a bishop in Melbourne, was by his side. To victims it was an image that suggested George Pell was on the side of the abusers. The judge who sentenced Ridsdale to 18 years in prison said this about his crimes.

SENTENCING JUDGE (voiceover): In seeking to sate your perverted lust it seems no victim was too frail or vulnerable. Your acts of debauchery were wicked and appalling. The victims were not given, in my view, any priority by your superiors in the Catholic Church, aware of your conduct.

LEIGH SALES: George Pell has faced questions every since about his support for Father Ridsdale.

(To George Pell) Cardinal, Leigh Sales from the 7.30 program. In 1993 you accompanied to court a priest who was a confessed paedophile and was then convicted.

GEORGE PELL: When I had accompanied Ridsdale to the court his lawyers wanted me to appear in the court. I said I would only do that on the condition that I would say, "I don't dispute the allegations, I don't dispute the good faith of the victims," all I would say is that he has done other good things. At that stage none of us - or at least I had - no idea or the enormity of, and the number of, Ridsdale's crimes. And...

LEIGH SALES: You knew there were some though?

GEORGE PELL: Obviously he'd been charged.

LEIGH SALES: So, why did you accompany him to the court?

GEORGE PELL: As a priestly act of solidarity. In retrospect, I didn't realise then what a wrong impression it would give to the victims.

LEIGH SALES: Victims like Stephen Woods are still angry over Cardinal Pell's role in the Ridsdale case and the many that have followed it.

STEPHEN WOODS: I think Cardinal Pell needs to resign. He's shown by his words, especially over the last few weeks, that he doesn't get it. He doesn't realise by saying that it's "old hat" - and even the trauma of victims is old... and it's even the Church who is the victim now! A church that he is willing to say anything to protect the power and money base of the Church in society.

GEORGE PELL: What is important for the press and the public to realise: that because there is a persistent press campaign against the Catholic Church's adequacies and inadequacies in this area, that does not necessarily represent the percentage of the problem that we offer.

(In 1996) I've called this media conference to announce a strategy whereby the Catholic Church in Melbourne will be able to offer justice, compensation, counselling and professional support services to victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests.

LEIGH SALES: At an earlier press conference in 1996, George Pell announced the so-called "Melbourne response" to handle victims' complaints and compensation claims. The Towards Healing process, set up the following year, handles complaints in the rest of the country. In Victoria alone, more than 600 cases of criminal child abuse have been upheld in the past 16 years. Not one of them was referred to police.

HELEN LAST, VICTIMS ADVOCATE: The Melbourne response is basically a legalistic response, run by a QC, who... when you have a good examination of it you can see that it's basically an insurance claims process which he is administrating. And people are put through very superficially - in the shortest space of time, if that's possible.

LEIGH SALES: In a landmark case in 2007 in which Cardinal Pell was a defendant, the NSW Court of Appeal upheld the Church's claim that it cannot be held liable for abuse cases.

ANDREW MORRISON, AUSTRALIAN LAWYERS ALLIANCE: It found that the Church is not a legal entity, that it is too uncertain in size for anyone such as Cardinal Pell to be nominated to represent it, and that the trustees of the Church, which hold its very large assets, only hold them in respect of property matters - and even though, for example, they hold the property of a school, they can't be sued in respect of abuse which occurred on those school premises unless the Church consents. The other issue is: the Church is not liable for its priests because it technically does not employ them. Now that is not the case anywhere else in the common law world.

LEIGH SALES: This year, George Pell faced new questions on Four Corners over his handling of the case of an accused paedophile known as Father F. Cardinal Pell claimed that Father F had made no admissions, but court records showed the priest admitted under oath that there had been five boys around the age of 10 and 11 that he'd sexually interfered with, and he admitted telling that to three senior priests.

FOUR CORNERS PRESENTER (July 2012): Regarding two of the boys the report says that Father F:

REPORT (voiceover): Admitted that over a period of approximately 12 months he fondled the genitals of each of these boys and, to quote, "sucked off their dicks". This was done on about a monthly basis over a period of 12 months.

LEIGH SALES: Today Cardinal Pell was continuing to deny the Church has been involved in any sort of cover-up.

(To George Pell) How about the case of Father F who testified in court under oath that he had abused boys, and that he had told three priests about that in the early 90s, yet he remained a priest until 2005?

GEORGE PELL: Well, this is... I wasn't... this was the recent television? Now, I was not present at that interview. I was... what I said on the television was what I told about that interview. That was my understanding that it was correct. This is the subject of an investigation by Judge Whitlam, and who will announce his findings probably before the end of the year, and then we will see just what was said at that meeting. What I do know is that that priest was stood down in 1992...1992, he was prevented from working as a priest from that date.

LEIGH SALES: Can you understand how those sorts of things have given rise to a public cynicism that the Church is doing enough?

GEORGE PELL: I don't think there is a widespread public cynicism. There is a cynicism in elements of the press, in elements of the public. I don't think it's widespread. I think the general public certainly understands that we're serious about this.

LEIGH SALES: Today, Cardinal Pell said priests who confessed child sex abuse to other priests were still entitled to the seal of the confession box - a comment that met with disapproval.

BARRY O'FARRELL, NSW PREMIER: I heard Cardinal Pell today, Madam Speaker, indicate that the bonds of the confessional will remain intact and I understand that, Madam Speaker, as a Catholic - not a particularly good Catholic - that that is an important sanctity in our church. But I struggle to understand, Madam Speaker, that if a priest confessed to another priest that he has been involved in paedophile activities, that that information should not be brought to police.

LEIGH SALES: Cardinal Pell, just to be absolutely clear, will you appear yourself before the royal commission if you are called?

GEORGE PELL: I will do whatever... like every other Catholic priest or bishop, I comply with the law of the land and will cooperate fully, and we've got nothing we want to hide.

LEIGH SALES: And will you lift confidentiality agreements with people who have already struck settlements with the Catholic Church so they can testify?

GEORGE PELL: I'm not sure how many of those exist in this part of the world at all. People are free to say what they want. That's the way...

LEIGH SALES: So people aren't bound by confidentiality agreements that they've signed in the past?

GEORGE PELL: I don't know anything. As far as I was concerned there would be no problem with me. If there are with other people they will have to answer.

LEIGH SALES: Cardinal George Pell at his press conference today.