Federal election 2016: Xenophon not sorry for rape claims, by Michael Owen, Australian (June 28, 2016)

Nick Xenophon says he is more concerned about the welfare of former priest John Hepworth than the innocent senior cleric the senator named in parliament as an alleged rapist.

The independent South Australian senator has never apologised to Monsignor Ian Dempsey for using parliamentary privilege in September 2011 to name him as one of three priests who allegedly abused retired Archbishop Hepworth, the former head of the Traditional Anglican Communion, in a Catholic seminary in the 1960s.

This is despite Monsignor Dempsey, who was suspended from his southern Adelaide parish of Brighton and Hallett Cove for 12 months, being cleared in three separate investigations by the church, police and the Director of Public Prosecutions.

An independent report by Adelaide silk Michael Abbott also cleared Monsignor Dempsey.

Archbishop Hepworth also had asked Senator Xenophon not to name Monsignor Dempsey.

Senator Xenophon — who leads a new party that could hold the balance of power after Saturday’s election — remains unrepentant about wrongly naming the Adelaide priest as a perpetrator of clerical sexual abuse.

Senator Xenophon, who defied warnings in 2011 of the implications of airing a 50-year-old matter that at the time was not even the subject of a police report, remained unmoved when asked about it five years later and whether he would ever apologise.

“No, but I have had an opportunity to speak to John Hepworth today to see how he is faring,” Senator Xenophon said.

Monsignor Dempsey told The Australian that, before people cast a vote for Senator Xenophon and his candidates, they should know the man behind the political mask.

Senator Xenophon, a lawyer, was drawn to populist causes for his own ends and ultimately was shallow and uncaring about the consequences, he said.

“All I am looking for is some justice and truth in what’s happened. Firstly, he never apologised and, secondly, the media never really publicised the fact that after three inquiries there was no evidence found that I was guilty of anything,” Monsignor Dempsey said.

“I just pray for justice and truth, that it will finally come out. If voters know the truth and lack of justice about what he did to me, they can then make their own decisions.

“They may think that because of what he supposedly does for many people that the good outweighs the bad, but I don’t want to take sides politically.”

Archbishop Hepworth, however, said despite his friendship with Senator Xenophon he was working to ensure people voted Liberal rather than for the Nick Xenophon Team.

“I am handing out how-to-vote cards for Nicolle Flint in Boothby. Nick is an old friend and I wish him well ... Nick made his decision (to name Monsignor Dempsey) even though at the time I asked him not to, but he went ahead with it,” Archbishop Hepworth said yesterday. “It would have been better if he hadn’t, in retrospect.”