Child Sex Abuse Victims Threaten Legal Action over Inquiry

By David Barrett
The Telegraph
April 10, 2015

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/child-protection/11527344/Child-sex-abuse-victims-threaten-legal-action-over-inquiry.html

Justice Lowell Goddard

Victims of child sexual abuse are poised to launch legal action against the Home Office over the set-up of the Government’s inquiry into allegations of high-level paedophile rings.

Lawyers acting for a number of abuse survivors intend to challenge a decision by Theresa May, the Home Secretary, to exclude representatives of victim’s groups from the inquiry panel.

Theresa May, the Home Secretary

Justice Lowell Goddard, the inquiry chairman, said last month that it would be inappropriate to appoint survivors to the panel – which will hear evidence alongside her – because they may lack “objectivity”.

Victims now intend to challenge her over those comments and demand an apology.

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Unless the Home Office appoints survivors’ representatives to the panel they also intend to launch judicial review proceedings in the High Court.

“We think this is necessary because they are not listening to survivors,” said Phil Frampton, of the White Flowers Campaign Group, an umbrella organisation for survivors’ groups.

“We want to rescue this from descending into farce and discrediting the whole inquiry.

“We will make representations to Justice Goddard and see what she has to say before going to judicial review.

“She said that they cannot have survivors on the inquiry panel because they lack objectivity – and that is an insult to survivors.

“It’s like saying you cannot have a judge deciding any cases of burglary if they have been burgled.”

Last month Justice Goddard issued a statement in which she said “the appointment of victims or survivors to the panel will not, in my view, be consistent with the objectivity, independence and impartiality that is required of members of an independent panel who are required to act in a quasi-judicial capacity”.

The inquiry was established by Mrs May last summer to look into wide-ranging allegations of paedophile abuse in some of Britain's most high-profile institutions, including the Westminster political elite, the BBC and the Church.

A Home Office spokesman declined to comment.