Children at Anglican Children's Home in Lismore Were Physically and Sexually Abused by Clergy and Staff, Royal Commission Is Told

By Jim O'Rourke
The Daily Telegraph
November 18, 2013

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/children-at-anglican-childrens-home-in-lismore-were-physically-and-sexually-abused-by-clergy-and-staff-royal-commission-is-told/story-e6frg6n6-1226762558682

The Anglican Church children's home is Lismore which was where much of the abuse took place over the course of 40 years dating from the mid-Forties. The Royal Commission's third inquiry into child abuse began taking evidence from victims today.

Richard 'Tommy' Campion after giving evidence at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. He was a victim of abuse at the North Coast Children's Home in Lismore.

CHILDREN were beaten with pony whips and canes at an Anglican Church children's home in Lismore, the Royal. Commission into child sexual abuse heard today.

Priests also performed sexual "cleansing" ceremonies on young boys, the opening day of the comission's third public hearing in Sydney was told.

In his opening address, counsel assisting, Simeon Beckett, said children as young as five were forced to perform oral sex on older residents.

Mr Beckett said children were sexually abused by clergy, staff and fellow residents between 1944 and 1985.

The hearings will also hear evidence about how the Anglican Church handled allegations of abuse and violence and dealt with claims for compensation

It will question Anglican Primate Phillip Aspinall on his role in negotiating settlements with former residents.

"The evidence is likely to reveal that a number of allegations of sexual abuse were reported to the Diocese of Grafton, but were not reported to police," Mr Beckett said

The hearing also heard that staff brutally punished children including making them parade around in sioled sheets when they wet the bed.

A witness, known as CK, said he was forced to eat his own vomit after he threw up an"atrocious" meal.

CK said he was regularly beaten by staff and sexually abused by clergy including being smeared with "stuff" that was then licked off.

"Today it would come under the title of a pedophile ring."

One witness, Tommy Campion, who said he was subjected to sexual, physical and psychological abuse at the hands of Anglican clergy and staff at the home for 14 years, said the church denied it had control of the home when 41 victims began seeking compensation.

Mr Campion, who was only two years old when he entered the home with his sister, began his bid for compensation in 2005.

A photograph has been submitted to the commission showing a sign outside the home in the 1970s saying it was an Anglican church institution.

The 65-year-old retired press photographer, who has campaigned for those who survived the abuse wrote a five-page letter to the church's Grafton Diocese in 2005 detailing the outlining the "complete and utter hell" he and children suffered at the home.

Mr Campion said it took him 45 years to reveal he had been abused by three different people because "I felt that no one would care.

"Sometimes I wish I had done so sooner."

Mr Campion told the Commission that the home's matron, Ada Martin, would punish children by hitting them with a tree branch after she had forced them to break it off a tree.

"She was the kingpin, she dished out the punishment," he said. "She was a savage lady."

Mr Campion said when he wet the bed he was dragged out by the throat by a staff member and had the soiled sheets wrapped around his head as punishment before he was told to wash the sheets himself in a laundry tub.

"It was barbaric . . . they were only little children."

Mr Campion eventually received a financial settlement in 2010, but decided to continue his fight "to reveal the truth" and force the Anglican church to accept responsibilty for the abuses at the home.