NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph
Child migrant sexually abused in Australia after arriving at Catholic home, abuse inquiry hears
BY MICHAEL MCHUGH – 02 SEPTEMBER 2014
A former child migrant from Northern Ireland to Australia has told a public inquiry he was transferred with no idea where he was going and faced more sexual abuse when he arrived in a Catholic home there.
Des McDaid, 70, said he was targeted by older boys, a lay teacher and members of the Christian Brothers religious order which ran the Clontarf institution near Perth in Western Australia. Aged eight, he was not told where he was going when he was transferred on board the ship the New Australian.
He gave evidence to the Historical Institutional Abuse (HIA) inquiry, which was established by ministers in Belfast.
He said: “The big thing I want you to remember is the helplessness.”
He said he was raped by an older boy at the Termonbacca boys home in Londonderry run by an order of nuns and the paedophilia continued in Australia.
Using a video link from Australia, he said: “I had a lot more of it over here, from the Christian Brothers etc.”
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