Chapter 13

Introduction

The Board of Inquiry repeatedly heard from victim-survivors and secondary victims that the education system, and individuals within it, failed to protect children from sexual abuse in Victorian government schools from 1960 up to at least 1994. During the Board of Inquiry’s public hearings, the Department of Education (Department) itself frankly acknowledged its various failures.

In this report, ‘the education system’ includes the Department, officials in the Department, and members of the teaching service, such as teachers and principals.

Chapter 11, The alleged perpetrators(opens in a new window), provides a detailed summary of the experiences of child sexual abuse that victim-survivors shared with the Board of Inquiry. It also outlines what was known (and what was not known) within the education system at the time and how the system responded to disclosures and reports of child sexual abuse.

In relation to Darrell Ray and Wyatt, Chapter 11 shows that despite being aware of a number of concerns about the sexual nature of their conduct involving students, the education system took inadequate action to protect students from the risk of harm. In relation to David MacGregor, Chapter 11(opens in a new window) shows that parents needed to pressure the Department to take action in light of the criminal charges against him before the Department moved him from the classroom, and even then, despite having been convicted, the Department continued to employ him until he chose to retire. In relation to Graham Steele, the Board of Inquiry did not receive any information to indicate that Victoria Police conveyed to the Department the serious allegations of child sexual abuse made against him. There was no protocol in the Department to ensure that such allegations were conveyed from Victoria Police to the Department, and Mr Steele continued to teach until early 1990.

Chapter 11(opens in a new window) highlights the opportunities the education system missed to respond to concerns and complaints about the conduct of the alleged perpetrators: Mr Ray, Wyatt, Mr MacGregor and Mr Steele.

As discussed in Chapter 6, Time and place(opens in a new window), in the 1960s and 1970s sex and sexuality was not well understood and there was limited understanding of child sexual abuse. However, these contextual matters do not excuse the education system for failing to manage the risk of child sexual abuse in its schools. Schools were the place where parents and carers sent their children to be safe. Child safety should have always been the education system’s paramount priority. Yet the concept of child safety and welfare was not introduced into legislation concerning the education system until 1980.¹ Further, even though it was understood that child sexual abuse in schools could occur, Dr David Howes PSM, Deputy Secretary, Schools and Regional Service, Department of Education, provided evidence that between 1960 and 1984, the Education Act 1958 (Vic), the Teaching Service Act 1958 (Vic) (Teaching Service Act) and the Public Service Act 1958 (Vic) (Public Service Act) only referred to child safety in the context of children’s physical safety.²

This Chapter examines the adequacy of the education system’s response to historical child sexual abuse in government schools. In particular, it considers:

• the existence and effectiveness of the Department’s policies and procedures in preventing and responding to child sexual abuse in government schools between 1960 and 1999
• the Department’s culture at that time and how it enabled child sexual abuse to occur.

The Chapter sets out the Board of Inquiry’s findings about the education system, including the Department. It shows that there were repeated and systemic failures to respond to and prevent child sexual abuse.

A catastrophic failing

By today’s standards, it is hard to imagine any government institution, let alone a school, that would not have in place a full suite of child safety policies and procedures. Today, there are clear frameworks that require the education system to quickly respond to any form of child sexual abuse occurring in a government school (as explored in Chapter 14, Learning and improving(opens in a new window)).

While child sexual abuse may have been perceived differently between 1960 to 1999 (as Chapter 6(opens in a new window) explains), Victorian communities in the twentieth century still had strong expectations that children would be safe at school and that child sexual abuse would be responded to appropriately.

Professor Lisa Featherstone, Head of School, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, University of Queensland, emphasised that communities at the time expected incidents of child sexual abuse to be dealt with harshly.³ Dr Katie Wright, Associate Professor, Department of Social Inquiry, La Trobe University, explained that criminal law has criminalised sexual assault of children since the early colonial period, demonstrating a clear awareness of the occurrence of child sexual abuse and the need to protect children from it.⁴ This expert evidence is consistent with the Department’s records from the relevant period, which provided many examples of parents who had raised strong concerns with the Department at the time about child sexual abuse occurring at their child’s school.

Over the decades, the understanding of the need to prevent and address child sexual abuse grew alongside other movements, including the feminist movement.⁵ By the 1980s, discussion about child sexual abuse was becoming more widespread in the Australian media and was increasingly recognised as a societal problem.⁶ From the 1980s, reforms were introduced in Australia around mandatory reporting.⁷

Despite this, the Board of Inquiry found that the Department’s response to child sexual abuse from the 1960s all the way up to the 1990s was not aligned with community expectations or social reforms.

During the Board of Inquiry’s public hearings, the Department did not shy away from its failings. Jenny Atta PSM, Secretary, Department of Education, described the Department’s past response to child sexual abuse disclosures as ‘woefully inadequate or inappropriate’.⁸ Ms Atta acknowledged that this ‘left the victims and those trying to protect them powerless, and enabled the abuse of children to continue and to spread’.⁹ Dr Howes acknowledged that it was ‘impossible to overstate how inadequate the response of the [Department]’ was to allegations of child sexual abuse.¹⁰

The Board of Inquiry has concluded that there was no single reason for this inadequacy. Instead, the Department’s response can be characterised by a series of repeated, systemic and self-reinforcing failures. As to these failures, the Board of Inquiry finds that:

1. between 1960 and 1994 there was an absence of policies or procedures concerning child sexual abuse, including how to respond to allegations¹¹
2. between 1960 and 1994 there was an absence of guidance to staff on how to manage, respond to and prevent child sexual abuse and support staff to identify and report suspected child sexual abuse¹²
3. between 1960 and 1994 there was a culture of prioritising the reputation of the education system, including schools and teachers, over the safety of children¹³
4. between 1960 and 1994 there was no training of staff to recognise, raise concerns and respond appropriately to perceived or disclosed child sexual abuse¹⁴
5. between 1960 and 1994 there were poor record-keeping and information-sharing practices regarding allegations of child sexual abuse and to reduce risks of reoffending¹⁵
6. there have been no systemic reviews led by the Department to understand the scope and scale of historical child sexual abuse in government schools from 1960 to today.

Although the Terms of Reference require the Board of Inquiry to examine the time period 1960 to 1999, the first five findings relate to the time period 1960 to 1994. This is because mandatory reporting for teachers in Victorian government schools was introduced in 1994 and was accompanied by the introduction of a range of processes relating to child sexual abuse developed by the Department.

These failings are discussed in detail throughout this Chapter.

The void where policy and procedures should have stood

As outlined in Chapter 10, The education system(opens in a new window), the evidence considered by the Board of Inquiry establishes that there were no policies or procedures in the Department between 1960 and 1994 concerning child sexual abuse, including how to respond to allegations.

This policy and procedure void existed despite the fact that there was a legislative and regulatory framework during this period that gave the education system power to discipline staff:

• under the Teaching Service Act, the Director-General could receive reports about ‘any member under his control who is guilty of a breach’ under the Act
• under the Teaching Service Regulations 1958 (Vic) (Teaching Service Regulations), which sat under the Teaching Service Act, teaching staff were not to engage in any business that would ‘impair his moral influence over his pupils’
• under the Public Service Act, the Director-General had responsibility for hearing an officer’s defence and determining the disciplinary approach for any officer who was ‘guilty of misconduct’.

Ms Atta gave evidence about the dearth of policies and procedures in the Department, stating that:

Similarly, Dr Howes gave evidence that there was repeated failure by the Department to mitigate risks against students, because of ‘the lack of documented and required policies and procedures to be followed’.¹⁷

As a result of this gap in policies and procedures, staff responded to allegations of child sexual abuse in an inconsistent and ad hoc way. This gap also meant there were no policies or procedures in place for the provision of support to victim-survivors and their families, when child sexual abuse was disclosed.

Absence of guidance and support for staff

In addition to an absence of policies and procedures, the evidence before the Board of Inquiry establishes that between 1960 and 1994, there was no guidance for staff on how to identify or report child sexual abuse, or what steps to take to investigate and respond to it.¹⁸

What little guidance existed at the time focused on the physical safety of children only or, alarmingly, existed solely for the purpose of protecting the wellbeing and employment of teachers.

This is evident in a 1958 memorandum the Department sent to head teachers, encouraging male teachers not to place their hands on female students. The memorandum stated:

Dr Howes accepted that this memorandum, and its subsequent versions, were focused on the reputation of male teachers.²⁰ He further stated that ‘the silences in this document are as telling to me as the words. There is no reference to the safety or the wellbeing of girl students, more broadly’.²¹

The evidence demonstrated that instead of clear policies and procedures, there was a devolved structure that gave principals, district inspectors and senior officials a large degree of autonomy in how they responded to allegations of child sexual abuse.²²

This lack of guidance is relevant in understanding how the education system failed to adequately respond to numerous complaints about Mr Ray’s behaviour.

The Board of Inquiry heard that between the early and mid-1970s, numerous complaints or reports of child sexual abuse allegedly perpetrated by Mr Ray at Beaumaris Primary School were made by parents, students and teachers, to senior teachers and the principal, and were also referred to a district inspector.²³

Yet little was done to address Mr Ray’s behaviour, despite the seriousness of the concerns being raised. The principal did put in place some basic measures that appear to have been aimed at reducing Mr Ray’s opportunity to offend, including asking mothers to volunteer in the library (where Mr Ray worked) and removing Mr Ray’s library keys after hours.²⁴

Records indicate that the principal and district inspector intended to investigate the complaints, but there is no evidence to indicate that this occurred in a meaningful way. Commenting on these actions, Dr Howes acknowledged that there were no records available that outlined what form an investigation took, assuming it happened at all.²⁵ Dr Howes also stated that the Department had no evidence that ‘allegations were investigated in anything that would resemble a serious way’.²⁶

Mr Ray continued to teach at Beaumaris Primary School until 1976, before moving to Mount View Primary School. He was moved to Mount View Primary School notwithstanding mounting concerns about his behaviour at Beaumaris Primary School. Subsequently, he was convicted in relation to sexual offending that he perpetrated against a student between 1978 and 1979, while he worked as a teacher librarian at Mount View Primary.

During the Board of Inquiry’s hearings, it was put to Dr Howes that Mr Ray’s continued employment in the face of numerous complaints about his behaviour, about which a principal and district inspector were aware, was ‘an egregious failure of the system’.²⁷ Dr Howes agreed and gave evidence that there was a:

Dr Howes also noted that:

The Board of Inquiry received evidence indicating that the environment in the education system at the time was not supportive of people bringing complaints forward. For example, a parent was informed by the Department that they would need to put their complaint in writing, but their lawyer advised them that they may be charged with libel if they did.³⁰ In response, the parent removed their child from the school rather than pursue the complaint.³¹ The Department offered no support to the parent to pursue their complaint.

Research indicates the culture within a school setting can either encourage or deter reporting child sexual abuse.³² Staff can experience barriers to reporting, especially from administrators (such as principals or officials of the Department). An example of these barriers, based on research, is administrators failing to make official reports when information was disclosed to them, or dismissing a report outright.³³ According to this research, staff who experienced or witnessed these barriers felt reluctant to make future reports, either out of fear of having their motives questioned or because they felt like nothing would be done to act on the report.³⁴

The Board of Inquiry was also told that across the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, a common response to a disclosure of child sexual abuse was to remove the child from immediate danger rather than to report the sexual abuse to the criminal justice system.³⁵ Another response was to tell children to stay away from specific teachers, often meaning that the burden was placed on children to avoid sexual abuse.³⁶

The lack of guidance and support given to teachers about responding to child sexual abuse meant the safety of children was put at risk.

The reputation of the education system was prioritised over children’s safety

While the Board of Inquiry has found there was a dearth of policies, procedures and guidance concerning child sexual abuse between 1960 and 1994, perhaps even more concerningly, it also found that there was a culture of prioritising the education system, including the reputation of schools and teachers, above the safety of children.

The Department gave evidence that in most instances of child sexual abuse known to the Board of Inquiry, it prioritised the reputation and interests of the alleged perpetrators over the safety of children.³⁷

The primary example of this culture was the Department’s use of transfers to move alleged perpetrators between schools or into a non-teaching position as a way of ‘managing’ complaints made (or concerns raised) about their conduct.

This practice was known to have occurred as early as 1882. The 1882 Royal Commission into the Administration, Organisation, and General Condition of the Existing System of Public Instruction (1882 Royal Commission) raised concerns about district inspectors who had received reports of teachers engaging in ‘immoral conduct’ with students, and who recommended the teacher be moved to another school or different duties rather than be dismissed altogether.³⁸

When questioned by the 1882 Royal Commission, previous officials in the Department responded that it was important to consider the issue of the immoral conduct from the teacher’s perspective, to reduce the risk of reputational damage for what was seen as a ‘comparatively small offence’.³⁹

The Board of Inquiry found that the use of transfers to manage incidents of child sexual abuse continued to occur all the way up to the mid-1980s, with apparently similar cultural views to those prevalent in 1882 underpinning the practice.

A striking example of this practice is found in the way the Department handled reports of pending child sexual abuse charges against Mr MacGregor in 1985, when he was employed at Kunyung Primary School.

When impending charges against Mr MacGregor were first brought to the Department’s attention on 27 February 1985,⁴⁰ by parents who had complained to the police, the Department did not remove Mr MacGregor from the classroom. Instead, officials’ immediately invited Mr MacGregor to ʻexplore his wishes regarding school placement’ and a possible transfer to a non-teaching position.⁴¹ After Mr MacGregor objected to being moved from the school, the Department did not pursue the matter.⁴²

Further, the Department resolved to reconsider the matter only under certain circumstances. A letter from the then Assistant Regional Director of Education for the Westernport Region to the then Director of the Personnel Industrial Relations Branch of the Department emphasised that Mr MacGregor’s position as a teacher may need to be revisited if tensions escalated with the community.⁴³ The letter stated that ‘further regional action should only take place if and when a formal complaint, specifying names and allegations, is submitted’.⁴⁴ In the meantime, Mr MacGregor was allowed to continue teaching students.

The Department made this decision despite having access to legislative and regulatory mechanisms that would enable it to suspend a teacher while investigations were underway, to ensure children’s safety, and to dismiss a teacher if allegations of child sexual abuse were proven.⁴⁵

On 24 May 1985, the Department received further correspondence from a parent who had complained to the police, stating that Mr MacGregor had been charged.⁴⁶ At this time, it chose to transfer him to a non-teaching position and not remove him from the teaching service.⁴⁷ The date of transfer was effective one day before the Department responded to the parent, indicating the likelihood that the Department only made this decision as a result of the parent’s letter.⁴⁸

Dr Howes noted that the Department did not undertake investigations into Mr MacGregor until he was sentenced by the court.⁴⁹ Only after this did the Department undertake its own investigation and charge him before the Teachers Tribunal.⁵⁰

The Teachers Tribunal banned Mr MacGregor from teaching until 1988 (a suspension of just over two years) and appointed him to a regional office as a penalty.⁵¹ Mr MacGregor could apply for a teaching position once the ban had run its course.⁵²

During the Board of Inquiry’s public hearings, when asked about the Department’s decision-making in relation to Mr MacGregor at that time, Dr Howes stated:

Dr Howes also speculated that there were two reasons transfers were used in the relevant period, either formally, as a disciplinary mechanism, or informally, as an incident management strategy. First, the Department was ‘privileging the reputation and the ongoing employment of a member of staff’.⁵⁴ Second, child sexual abuse did not appear to be seen as a sufficient reason or a strong enough offence to warrant termination by the Department.⁵⁵

Ms Atta also acknowledged in her evidence that although the Department had mechanisms in place at the time of Mr MacGregor’s known offending to remove teachers who had committed child sexual abuse, they were ‘rarely, if ever, used’, and that ‘[t]eachers were able to remain in their role or transfer to other schools and continue to abuse’.⁵⁶

Ms Atta noted that the Department’s response at the time was in disconnect with community expectations and that it was actively trying to sustain the employment of an alleged perpetrator.⁵⁷ Ms Atta said that it is difficult to understand how the Department ‘whose sole purpose is the care, supervision and education of children, could be impervious’ to community expectations.⁵⁸

This behaviour and culture reflects broader findings from experts and the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (Royal Commission) about how institutions tend to respond to allegations of child sexual abuse. Dr Wright gave evidence to the Board of Inquiry that institutions, including schools, traditionally responded to child sexual abuse in a ‘self-protective’ way that prioritised the institution over victim-survivors.⁵⁹

The Royal Commission also reported that schools were governed by cultures where people were not held accountable for child sexual abuse.⁶⁰ Instead, there was a tendency to prioritise the reputational and financial interests of schools and the system over the safety of a child.⁶¹

Professor Michael Salter, Professor of Criminology, School of Social Sciences, University of New South Wales, gave evidence to the Board of Inquiry that all children in institutional settings were ‘largely abandoned by the State when it came to detecting and prosecuting child sexual abuse’.⁶² Other evidence given by Dr Salter echoed the Royal Commission’s observations. He explained that formal and informal structures led to allegations being dismissed and the ‘reputation of the institution being prioritised over the wellbeing of the child’.⁶³ He said that these structures included having practices in place that actively ensured indications of child sexual abuse were not acted upon, due to the risk that any indications of child sexual abuse occurring at schools would bring individual offenders and schools into disrepute.⁶⁴

The Department’s culture was institution-centred rather than children-centred. As a result, not only was there no clear requirement for people within the education system with relevant authority to adequately respond to allegations of child sexual abuse or put in place appropriate measures to guard against the risk of child sexual abuse, but those people were also not motivated to take these measures. As Dr Howes acknowledged in his evidence:

Lack of staff training

The Board of Inquiry also found that between 1960 and 1994, there was no form of teacher training or instruction on how to raise concerns about concerning behaviour or alleged child sexual abuse.

Dr Howes agreed that, despite the requirement in the Teaching Service Regulations to report misconduct, there was no guidance or avenue for a teacher to report suspicions of child sexual abuse at that time.⁶⁶ Dr Howes told the Board of Inquiry that no training existed to help teachers to understand their reporting obligations,⁶⁷ including how to identify warning signs and what to do with that information.⁶⁸

As outlined in Chapter 11(opens in a new window), the Board of Inquiry heard on several occasions that some teachers and senior staff at Beaumaris Primary School and other relevant schools were, at the very least, suspicious of ‘out of the ordinary’ behaviour by alleged perpetrators. It is also clear that some employees had very strong concerns that child sexual abuse was occurring, but did not always have the knowledge or training to act on their concerns.

For example, a former assistant principal at Beaumaris Primary School recalled that a mother of a student made a complaint to him about Mr Ray putting his hands down her son’s pants in 1975.⁶⁹ The assistant principal escorted the mother to the principal to report the incident, but did not attend the meeting or follow up any further.⁷⁰ Instead, they assumed no disciplinary action occurred.⁷¹

The Board of Inquiry received other information about parents who raised concerns with teachers about the conduct of alleged perpetrators, and from teachers who had their own concerns about alleged perpetrator conduct. However, as Dr Howes accepted in his evidence, there was no training to help teachers to correctly identify this type of conduct as child sexual abuse or to understand its seriousness, let alone know what to do with their concerns.⁷²

Ms Atta gave evidence to the Board of Inquiry that it was ‘very hard to explain why there was no training at the time’.⁷³ Ms Atta noted that guidance about responding to child sexual abuse was only introduced for principals, and then for teachers, in the early 2000s, and that it was ‘possibly’ reinforced by some training.⁷⁴ Ms Atta explained that major changes to improve training were introduced in 2016 following significant reforms driven by the Royal Commission and the Parliamentary Inquiry into the Handling of Child Abuse by Religious and Other Non-Government Organisations.⁷⁵

District inspectors apparently also received no training to appropriately respond to alleged child sexual abuse, despite it being a part of their role. A 1961 report by the Australian Council for Educational Research found that district inspectors received no special training when appointed.⁷⁶ Instead, they learned the functions and principles of their jobs from their previous teaching experience, a brief induction under an existing inspector, and a brief period in the head office.⁷⁷

Where training and procedures do not exist, staff can often struggle to know what to do in response to concerning behaviour, or can become indoctrinated into existing cultural practices such as those discussed in this Chapter. Staff may also form the view that the lack of training and procedures is a signal that prevention of child sexual abuse is not a matter of priority within the education system.

The Board of Inquiry considers that the Department’s failure to equip staff with basic training or instruction in relation to child sexual abuse resulted in a number of missed opportunities to respond to and address child sexual abuse when it was suspected or disclosed, and to manage the risk of further child sexual abuse occurring.

Poor record-keeping and information-sharing practices

Record-keeping

The Board of Inquiry found that between 1960 and 1994, there were no policies, procedures or guidance regarding record-keeping directly related to child sexual abuse.

Dr Howes gave evidence to the Board of Inquiry that the Department was unable to find any information about historical record-keeping policies regarding allegations of child sexual abuse.⁷⁸

The Department did not put in place any policies, procedures or guidance requiring principals, district inspectors or senior staff to record disclosures of child sexual abuse, by children or adults, or actions taken in response to a disclosure.

While some record-keeping practices were apparent — for example, the disciplinary processes recorded in relation to Mr Ray and Mr MacGregor — the Board of Inquiry found that this was not a consistent or comprehensive practice.⁷⁹ Even within the records, detailed steps of the investigation and the findings were not recorded.

Despite the number of alleged disclosures and reports made, there were no departmental records found from the time of those disclosures detailing what had been disclosed or reported, let alone what had been done in response.

For example, the Department provided evidence that a district inspector was called in to investigate complaints about Mr Ray in 1975.⁸⁰ Dr Howes gave evidence to the Board of Inquiry that ‘there is no record of a written investigation’ in regard to this matter.⁸¹

Dr Howes did give evidence that the Department had put in place a policy for schools to record incidents of physical safety. However, he also recognised that this policy seemed to have been put in place as a means to respond to civil litigation claims, rather than in the interests of student wellbeing and safety.⁸²

Even where an investigation was undertaken or a decision was made in response to allegations, the outcome was often not communicated to parents, the victim-survivor or others.⁸³

Further, the Board of Inquiry received information that showed that the Department did not always record the reasons for teacher transfers (described earlier in this Chapter). A former district inspector provided anecdotal information to the Department that there was a process of adjusting classroom numbers to create the impression that there was an excess of teachers at a school.⁸⁴ This apparent excess was then used as the mechanism to transfer teachers who had committed child sexual abuse without there being a record for why the transfer occurred.⁸⁵ In his evidence, Dr Howes accepted that this practice meant that schools receiving these teachers were unlikely to know about the teachers’ conduct and the associated risks or issues.⁸⁶

Reasons for transfers, even when it was used as a formal disciplinary mechanism, were not always recorded or shared. For example, in the case of Mr MacGregor, the Board of Inquiry understands that the Kunyung Primary School Council determined not to disclose the reasons for Mr MacGregor’s transfer because of ‘legal implications’, and instead to refer to it as an ‘administrative transfer’.⁸⁷

This practice made it difficult for other schools, organisations and individuals to manage risks. It was up to parents, teachers and other organisations to identify and manage risks informally.

For example, the Board of Inquiry received information that Mr MacGregor applied for and was successful in obtaining a teaching position at Langwarrin Park Primary School shortly after his suspension finished in late 1988. He was only prevented from commencing that role when the principal of Langwarrin Park Primary School wrote to the Department to object to the appointment on the basis of Mr MacGregor’s publicly known conviction.⁸⁸

The employment records of other alleged perpetrators also contained worryingly little information about key events or relevant facts. Following his resignation in the wake of an investigation, Mr Ray’s employment record was updated to include a note that he was ‘not to be re-employed without reference to the Director of Primary Education’.⁸⁹ However, there was no reference to his criminal convictions. The Board of Inquiry also received evidence that in the Department’s Resource Register Placemat Wyatt’s employment file only stated, ‘not to be re-employed or given [casual relief teaching] approval, without reference’.⁹⁰

Information-sharing

Based on the information the Department provided to the Board of Inquiry, it does not appear there were any departmental policies, procedures or protocols between 1960 and 1994 for the Department and Victoria Police to share information concerning allegations of child sexual abuse.

However, as discussed in Chapter 11(opens in a new window), based on a 1957 Police Standing Order and police manuals in the late 1990s, that there was an obligation on Victoria Police to share crime reports with the Department regarding information that a student had been sexually abused while in the care of a government school.⁹¹

It appears that Victoria Police did share crime reports with the Department in regard to Mr Ray. However, based on the information available to the Board of Inquiry, it is not clear whether crime reports were consistently shared. This may be partly related to the record-keeping practices of Victoria Police, whereby all files were paper-based prior to 1990. As a result, it is difficult today to comprehensively identify all the instances where information was shared with the Department.

Even if there were reports made to Victoria Police that should have been shared with the Department but were not, it is not clear that it would have produced a different outcome in any given case. In 1990, an official of the Department stated that ‘[t]he continued employment of teachers found guilty of indictable offences is assessed individually and a decision regarding future employment is made accordingly in each case’.⁹²

In this regard, Dr Howes gave evidence to the Board of Inquiry that ‘there were no standard procedures for saying if someone is guilty of an indictable offence, here is what’s going happen’.⁹³

In the case of Mr MacGregor, despite the Department being aware of allegations of child sexual abuse against him and his subsequent convictions, the Department did not seek to have his registration revoked by the relevant registration body and he remained working in the Department, albeit in an administrative position.

Dr Howes accepted in his evidence that the lack of record-keeping and information-sharing in relation to child sexual abuse incidents reflected the culture in the education system at the time of ‘sweeping these issues under the rug’.⁹⁴ It also created an environment where the ‘problem’ was simply ‘moved on’ without being properly addressed. Clearly, this put children at risk.

No systemic reviews

Finally, and putting aside work the Department did in response to the commencement of this Board of Inquiry, the evidence before the Board of Inquiry establishes that the Department has never adequately investigated historical child sexual abuse in government schools in relation to the allegations about teachers at Beaumaris Primary School and other schools within scope of this inquiry. There have been no systemic reviews to understand the scope and scale of what occurred, as discussed below.

At the time: no investigations undertaken

Investigations at or around the time of the child sexual abuse by the alleged perpetrators were inadequate. An adequate investigation would have sought to establish whether other allegations of child sexual abuse or concerns about the alleged perpetrators’ behaviour were raised while they were teaching at government schools; and what steps, if any, were taken in response to any other allegations. The investigations would have relied not only on records, but would have involved interviewing relevant individuals, such as teachers and principals who worked with the alleged perpetrators, and parents and students who had raised concerns. There are various reasons why such investigations were important to undertake. Undertaking them may have affected decisions made about a teacher’s future employment; parents who had concerns about their children may have been contacted so they could take steps to support their children; and matters may have been drawn to the attention of the police. This list is not exhaustive.

As no adequate investigations were undertaken, the full picture of child sexual abuse could not be understood. For the sake of students and parents who raised concerns, and other children who may have been at risk, the Department should have taken all steps available to it to understand the behaviours of teachers it employed in government primary schools, once it became aware of concerns or allegations of child sexual abuse by a teacher.

In relation to Mr Ray, in November 1978 the Department became aware that Mr Ray had been charged with sexual offences against children.⁹⁵ The Department was also told he had admitted to ‘many’ offences.⁹⁶ Nevertheless, and despite the fact he had been teaching for years in government schools, no adequate investigation into his behaviour was undertaken. If such an investigation had been made in late 1978 or early 1979, it likely would have become clear to the Department that other allegations and concerns had been raised. It may have made a difference to decisions about whether Mr Ray should ever be re-employed as a teacher in a government school or in a position that enabled access to children, or whether the Department should seek for Mr Ray’s registration as a teacher to be revoked.

In relation to Mr MacGregor, in February 1985, a parent raised serious concerns with the Department in writing about Mr MacGregor’s conduct while he was still working at a primary school.⁹⁷ The Department’s own records show that by March 1985, it was aware of impending criminal charges against Mr MacGregor.⁹⁸ By May 1985, the same parent wrote to the Department advising that Mr MacGregor had been charged with sexual offences against children.⁹⁹

At the very least, once it was known that Mr MacGregor had been criminally charged, the Department should have conducted an adequate investigation into his behaviour. The need for such an investigation is highlighted by the length of time he had been teaching in Victorian government schools (more than 22 years). It may have been that an investigation in 1985 in relation to Mr MacGregor would not have revealed much more to the Department at that time. However, that is not the point. Without doing that work, the Department was not in a position to know whether its decision-making in relation to Mr MacGregor was sound. The Department did not seek to have his registration revoked by the relevant registration body, and only suspended him from teaching for three years, after he was convicted of child sexual abuse.

The same failure applies in relation to Wyatt. He was convicted of child sex offences in the mid-1990s.¹⁰⁰ Although it is unclear precisely when the Department came to know of this information, the Department knew enough by March 1997 to record that he should not be re-employed without reference.¹⁰¹ Yet there was no adequate investigation undertaken into whether, in his years of service as a government school teacher, other allegations had been made or concerns raised about his behaviour. As with Mr Ray and Mr MacGregor, if the Department had engaged in an investigation at the time allegations were first known, it is likely it would have identified the kind of information it later identified in 2000 and 2001, as discussed below.

In the 2000s: not joining the dots through a systemic review

Decades later, and with substantial information available, the Department appeared to have made no attempt to examine linkages between apparently connected incidents, particularly at Beaumaris Primary School.

Between 1978 to 1997, the Department was aware of criminal charges and convictions in relation Mr Ray, Wyatt and Mr MacGregor regarding sexual offences they perpetrated against children while they were teaching at government schools.

In the 2000 and 2001, in the context of civil litigation, the Department received additional information and undertook its own work in relation to allegations concerning Mr Ray and Wyatt. By this stage, the Department had a substantial body of material raising serious concerns about the conduct of Mr Ray, Wyatt and Mr MacGregor. The Department also knew that they had all been employed at Beaumaris Primary School for two years, 1971 and 1972; although for one of those years Mr MacGregor had taken leave.¹⁰²

Between 2000 and 2001, at least 14 former Department staff, parents and students, and other family members were interviewed by representatives of the Department. As a result of these interviews, the Department received information about at least 13 allegations or concerns of improper conduct in relation to Mr Ray, Wyatt and Mr Steele while at Beaumaris Primary School (noting that it was also said that some of these allegations or concerns were raised with the Department before 2000 and 2001).

Yet there was no broader review undertaken at that time (or at any time prior to the work done by the Department in response to the Board of Inquiry’s establishment) to understand what had occurred at the school. The evidence Ms Atta gave during the Board of Inquiry’s public hearings indicated that the Department had only conducted investigations of the alleged child sexual abuse on a claim-by-claim basis and had not conducted any review to understand the breadth and extent of the problem.¹⁰³

In relation to the schools within the scope of this Board of Inquiry, the Department failed to proactively examine allegations of child sexual abuse in a systemic way, prior to the work it did upon the establishment of this inquiry. This is despite the Department knowing that there were particular schools where multiple allegations of child sexual abuse had been made; having a substantial amount of concerning information about three of the alleged perpetrators, as well as information about the fourth; and knowing that they all taught at Beaumaris Primary School at the same time. In the Board of Inquiry’s view, this inaction in the early 2000s indicates a lack of reflection and commitment on the Department’s behalf to proactively acknowledge, and learn from, past failures.

Current day: a lack of systemic review and acknowledgement

The Department has undertaken a range of work in response to this Board of Inquiry. This work includes what the Department knew of allegations or complaints at the relevant time, and what action was taken in response, in relation to the relevant employees and the schools where they taught. Yet the Department has not undertaken a systemic review on a statewide basis.

As a result, not all victim-survivors of sexual abuse at government schools have access to the same kind of information. They do not all know how extensive child sexual abuse was at their school, and whether they were alone in their experience. Victim-survivors within the scope of this inquiry have had the benefit of understanding, for example, whether other reports of child sexual abuse were made at their school, whether parents or others complained, and what the Department did, or did not do, at the time. In contrast, victim-survivors outside the scope of this inquiry do not have the benefit of such a body of work, unless they are provided with such information as part of a civil claim. Information of this kind is often essential to a victim-survivor in their journey of recovery.

The Board of Inquiry considers this further in Chapter 18, Looking to the future(opens in a new window).

Results of the Department’s inaction

The Department’s failure to adequately investigate allegations of child sexual abuse more fully at or around the time of the sexual abuse and to engage in a wider investigation of certain individuals undoubtedly put children at risk.

This is demonstrated by the lack of action taken in the early 1970s in relation to Wyatt and in the early to mid-1970s in relation to Mr Ray. In the case of Mr Ray, there is no doubt that children were sexually abused after the Department was aware of alleged child sexual abuse. For example, after numerous adults made complaints to the principal and district inspector about Mr Ray’s behaviour at Beaumaris Primary School, he moved to Mount View Primary School, where he was later convicted of sexual offences against a student at the school.¹⁰⁴

This failure has also meant that many victim-survivors have remained silent and unsupported, unaware that their experiences of child sexual abuse may have been shared by others — and that they are all entitled to and deserve support and healing.

The Department’s inaction has also meant it remains largely unaccountable for not adequately identifying and responding to a serious issue that permeated certain government schools between 1960 and 1999. Without a statewide review, the scale of child sexual abuse throughout the government school system during this period is currently unknown.

A wholly inadequate response

The Board of Inquiry concludes that the Department’s response to allegations of child sexual abuse between 1960 and 1999, and specifically between 1960 and 1994, constituted a gross systemic failure.

As discussed, these relate to six findings regarding an absence of policies and procedures; an absence of guidance to staff; a culture of prioritising the education system over the safety of children; inadequate staff training; poor record-keeping and information-sharing practices; and a failure to undertake systemic reviews.

These findings relate to the whole education system and are illustrated in various examples, outlined in this Chapter, involving the four alleged perpetrators discussed in Chapter 11(opens in a new window).

The Board of Inquiry agrees with Ms Atta’s evidence that ‘the failings of the system were many’.¹⁰⁵ The absence of policies or processes to prevent child sexual abuse or provide guidance on how to respond to allegations was stark.¹⁰⁶ There was no training for teachers or staff to be able to identify warning signs of sexual abuse.¹⁰⁷

Dr Salter provided sobering evidence to the Board of Inquiry that:

The Board of Inquiry agrees to the extent that the Department failed both in what it did, and what it failed to do. A culture of sweeping child sexual abuse under the rug, in favour of teacher reputation and employment, significantly contributed to the risk of ongoing child sexual abuse.

Because of a dearth of policies and guidance related to child sexual abuse, the Department missed opportunities to properly respond to concerns about possible child sexual abuse and, in so doing, failed to put in place measures to guard against the risk of child sexual abuse.

In regard to its actions, the Department used transfers to enable alleged perpetrators to maintain their employment by moving them to other schools or positions.¹⁰⁹ There were mechanisms that could have been used to remove alleged perpetrators from their teaching positions but they were rarely, if ever, used.¹¹⁰

The Board of Inquiry heard from many victim-survivors who recalled that they were sexually abused as children by the four alleged perpetrators discussed in Chapter 11(opens in a new window). Many have been profoundly affected by this child sexual abuse across many aspects of their life courses. Chapter 8, Enduring impacts of child sexual abuse(opens in a new window), discusses these impacts.

The Department’s apology

On 17 November 2023, during the Board of Inquiry’s hearings, Ms Atta issued a formal apology on behalf of the Department to the victim-survivors within the Board of Inquiry’s scope.

In her apology, Ms Atta acknowledged the Department’s failings and the impacts that these failings had on victim-survivors, their families and friends, and communities.

A copy of the Department’s apology is provided in Appendix J(opens in a new window).