Anglican Church Acknowledges Access to Choir for Pederast Cleric

By Michael McKenna
The Australian
October 24, 2014

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/anglican-church-acknowledges-access-to-choir-for-pederast-cleric/story-e6frg6nf-1227100348402

THE head of Australia’s Anglican Church has acknowledged the “cover-up’’ of child sexual abuse in Queensland and Britain as it emerged a pedophile clergyman was still allowed access to choirboys after the first complaints were made to church officials.

Primate of Australia, Melbourne Archbishop Philip Freier yesterday said he was profoundly disappointed with handling of allegations of horrific sexual abuse of boys by former Queensland headmaster, and later Dean of Manchester Robert Waddington over several decades.

A church-ordered inquiry in Britain this week found a “systemic failure” of church officials, led by the former Archbishop of York, now Lord David Hope of Thornes, in handling allegations against Waddington, made in 1999, 2003 and 2004.

The 164-page report by British judge Sally Cahill, following a year-long inquiry prompted by a joint investigation by The Australian and The Times, has sparked a proposed overhaul of child protection measures within the Church of England.

Among the mooted reforms is the removal of the confidentiality of the confessional in cases of child sex abuse, breaking a 900-year-old tradition, as well as a centralisation of complaints to a national body rather than being dealt by each diocese.

It follows a similar move in Australia, adopted at the General Synod in July, in which Anglican clergy and officials agreed to remove the confidentiality of the confessional when an offender admits to abusing a child.

Dr Freier yesterday welcomed Judge Cahill’s report saying Waddington’s victims had finally been vindicated after their allegations were dismissed for years.

“The report by an English judge that the former Archbishop of York Lord David Hope covered up sexual abuse of children in Australia and Britain is profoundly disappointing for the Anglican Church of Australia,’’ he said.

“Nevertheless we warmly welcome the report and are happy that the facts have emerged, providing vindication for the victims of Robert Waddington, who was principal of an Anglican school in north Queensland for nearly a decade to 1970.’’

Judge Cahill found that Lord Hope, who interviewed Waddington in 1999 and again in 2003 — accepting his denials of the abuse — kept the allegations from police and “put more children at risk through inadequate internal investigations”.

Judge Cahill said that while no victims had come forward to allege abuse by Waddington after the complaints to church officials, the senior clergyman had still been allowed access to children.

Waddington, who died in 2007 — after Lord Hope had told victims as early as 1999 that their abuser was near-death with cancer — was involved with a local choir in his retirement.

“As late as 1999 Robert Waddington was known to have access to the choirboys’ cloakroom at York Minister,” she said.

In a statement, Lord Hope denied he had deliberately covered up the abuse after handling allegations from Queenslander Bim Atkinson and later from former Manchester choirboy Eli Ward.

“Last May, in some of the reporting, it was suggested that there had been some cover-up by me,’’ he said. “This report makes clear that not applying the policy is not the same as a cover-up.

“If all that has been learned by organisations and the public about child abuse in the last 15 years had been known in 1999 and 2004 I would certainly have acted differently.’’