Royal Commission Told Salvation Army’s ‘physical and Sexual Abuse’ Was Rampant

By Janet Fife-Yeomans
The Australian
April 2, 2014

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/royal-commission-told-salvation-armys-physical-and-sexual-abuse-was-rampant/story-e6frg6n6-1226870944770

Allan Anderson leaves the Royal commission into institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. Source: News Corp Australia

SOME victims cannot bear to see the Salvation Army uniform, branding them “Gestapo.” Others refuse to enter their offices.

Yesterday Allan Anderson, who was abused by the Salvos in the Bexley Boys Home along with his little brother John, urged the public to think twice before donating to them.

“Boys and girls’ lives were damaged and any compensation should come from the organisation’s pockets, not the public’s,” Mr Anderson, 59, told the child sex abuse royal commission.

“Let me suggest to the public ... think twice before you put your hand in your pocket when the Salvation Army Red Shield ­Appeal comes around, for you should not give so generously."

Allan Anderson leaves the Royal commission into institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse today. Source: News Corp Australia

Another victim, 60, has turned down an offer from counsel for the Salvation Army to meet with officers after finishing his evidence at the commission.

“Absolutely not,” said the man, who was at the Salvation Army’s Riverview home in 1971, where he was physically abused and placed in solitary confinement.

“If I see one of those uniforms come within a metre of me, you’d better be there. OK? Just keep them away from me. If I see that Gestapo come near me.

“I’d like them in plain clothes with an open mind and a genuine heart. That’s how I’d like them.”

In its second hearing into the Salvation Army, the commission is looking at the way the organisation handled claims of sexual abuse and how it dealt with the perpetrators, at least one of whom was promoted.

Mr Anderson, a carpet retailer, was one of five children with parents who were blind from birth.

In 1966, when he was 11 and his brother, John, was six, they were sent to the Salvation Army’s Bexley Boys Home. Their two youngest sisters went to Arncliffe Girls Home. The oldest sister stayed at home to help their parents.

He said the Salvation Army had painted a rosy picture of the homes to their parents but the ­reality was physical and sexual abuse. He left Bexley after seven years but his brother, who has since died in a train accident, was there for 10 years.

“The physical and sexual abuse was rampant,” he said.

“The Salvation Army sat and did nothing in those dark years, although they say again, under oath, things have changed.

“Well, nothing has changed. While they say they are sorry, they are not. What they want is for all of this to go away.”