Long before the advent of the internet, the Philippines was a prime destination for Western child sex tourists. The US military presence in the country during and following the Vietnam War fuelled a demand…
For all its extraordinary impact, the Jimmy Savile scandal has not unfolded in an exceptional way. The media and justice systems’ treatment of the affair is only the latest example of a relatively new…
Fresh from its success calling on search engines to block access to child porn, the UK government is turning its attention to terrorism. Ministers are poised to call on internet service providers to block…
Michael Gove has taken aim at social workers and called for a major rethink of how they approach their work. According to the education secretary, social workers are often trained to see those they work…
The horrific neglect and subsequent death of Daniel Pelka at the hands of his mother and step-father raises a number of questions about safeguarding procedures and practice. We are told teachers were concerned…
Last week the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) asked the Vatican to disclose details of child sexual abuse cases involving Catholic clergy for the period November 1995 to January 2014. According…
Adults who were abused in childhood suffer from more chronic health conditions and put far greater pressure on the health system than those who were not abused, according to new research from the University…
The conviction of seven men for rape, child prostitution and trafficking in Oxford on Tuesday brings to an end another horrific case of child sexual exploitation. Social services were again in the firing…
“There is not, and there never was on this earth, a work of human policy so well deserving examination as the Roman Catholic Church.” So wrote Thomas Babington Macaulay in his review of Leopold von Ranke’s…
The awful record of the institutional Catholic church’s leadership in dealing with the scandal of clerical sex abuse of minors has clearly, and rightly, been a trigger for the federal government’s Royal…
With the year’s end tantalisingly close, Australia awaits the announcement of the Federal government’s terms of reference for the national Royal Commission into institutional responses to child sexual…
Alarm was raised this week when it emerged that Bernard McGrath, a former Catholic brother sought in Australia over 252 child sex charges, was able to leave New Zealand for Sri Lanka ahead of an extradition…
There is great support within the community for the Royal Commission into child sexual abuse. Many people have high hopes it will right the wrongs of the past and help us, as a nation, to eliminate future…
The Catholic Church has constructed a white curtain behind which networks of corruption have been allowed to deepen. Professor Patrick Parkinson, a senior lawyer who formally supported the Church’s “Towards…
Ireland has undergone a painful purification regarding widespread child sexual and physical abuse in what were once revered institutions of church and state. Since the 1990s, no less than 14 high-powered…
There has been a great deal of focus on the role of a Royal Commission in delivering “justice” for victims of sexual abuse. Justice is a powerful, symbolic principle, and being listened to can be a moving…
The terms of reference of the Gillard Government’s Royal Commission into institutional child abuse are yet to be determined. When the commission was announced, the Prime Minister noted that it would need…
Since Monday’s announcement of the creation of a Royal Commission into institutional child abuse there has been some discussion about what this might achieve. In short how will a Royal Commission be different…