Wales Child Abuse Scandal

Wales Child Abuse Scandal

The North Wales child abuse scandal was the subject of a three-year, £13 million investigation into the physical and sexual abuse of children in care homes in the counties of Clwyd and Gwynedd, in North Wales, including the Bryn Estyn children's home at Wrexham, between 1974 and 1990. The report into the scandal, headed by retired High Court judge Sir Ronald Waterhouse QC, which was published in 2000, resulted in changes in policy in England and Wales into how authorities deal with children in care, and to the settling of 140 compensation claims on behalf of victims of abuse.

In November 2012, new allegations led to the Prime Minister, David Cameron, announcing that a senior independent figure, later named as Mrs Justice Julia Macur, would examine the conduct and remit of the Waterhouse Inquiry. In addition, the Home Secretary, Theresa May, announced a new police inquiry into how the original allegations were dealt with, as well as an investigation of any new allegations. The broadcasting of false allegations on Newsnight on 2 November led to the resignation of the Director-General of the BBC, George Entwistle, eight days later.

The report of phase one of the police investigation, Operation Pallial, was published on 29 April 2013. It set out a total of 140 allegations of abuse at 18 children's homes in north Wales between 1963 and 1992.

Read more about Wales Child Abuse Scandal:  Background, Initial Reports of Abuse, Alison Taylor: Allegations, Dismissal and Publication, Initial Public Investigations, Jillings Report, The Waterhouse Inquiry, The Secret of Bryn Estyn: The Making of A Modern Witch Hunt, Further Allegations and Investigations in 2012, Operation Pallial, See Also

Famous quotes containing the words wales, child, abuse and/or scandal:

    I just come and talk to the plants, really—very important to talk to them, they respond I find.
    Charles, Prince Of Wales (b. 1948)

    If in the earlier part of the century, middle-class children suffered from overattentive mothers, from being “mother’s only accomplishment,” today’s children may suffer from an underestimation of their needs. Our idea of what a child needs in each case reflects what parents need. The child’s needs are thus a cultural football in an economic and marital game.
    Arlie Hochschild (20th century)

    How long, then, Catiline, while you abuse our patience? How long is this madness of yours to make sport of us?
    Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.)

    There is no scandal like rags, nor any crime so shameful as poverty.
    George Farquhar (1678–1707)