Wales Child Abuse Scandal - Alison Taylor: Allegations, Dismissal and Publication

Alison Taylor: Allegations, Dismissal and Publication

In the mid-1980s Alison Taylor, a residential care worker and then manager of a children's home in Gwynedd, began hearing stories from children coming to her home from across Clwyd and Gwynedd about a series of child sexual and abuse incidents in various care homes. On investigation, she found that several reports of these incidents had been made by both care and social workers, but that no procedural or disciplinary action had so far been taken as a result.

Creating a file around cases involving six children, Taylor made a series of allegations against senior social care professionals working for the authority which she raised with her superiors at the council, but again no action was taken. Taylor then reported her allegations to North Wales Police in 1986. The council suspended Taylor in January 1987, alleging that there had been a "breakdown in communications" between Taylor and her colleagues.

On two subsequent occasions, the council offered Taylor a financial termination agreement, subject to her signing a confidentiality agreement. After refusing to sign the confidentiality agreement, Taylor was dismissed. With the help of her trade union, Taylor took the council to an industrial tribunal, which was quickly closed after the parties came to an out of court financial settlement. In September 1989, Taylor accepted the agreement, which did not included an associated confidentiality agreement.

At the later Inquiry, Sir Ronald Waterhouse publicly vindicated Taylor. He stated that without Taylor's campaigning, there would have been no inquiry. Taylor was awarded a Pride of Britain award in 2000, and since 1996 has worked as a novelist.