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	Church Rehires Former Principal Who Failed Children ABC - the World Today December 2, 2010 http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2010/s3082773.htm SHANE MCLEOD: In Queensland, the Catholic Church has re-hired a former principal it sacked for failing to report sexual abuse allegations to police. The man's former colleague, Gerard Byrnes is now serving 10 years in jail for abusing 13 girls from a primary school in Toowoomba, west of Brisbane. The school's then-principal, who can't be named for legal reasons, was also charged because he didn't go to police with the allegations. But he was acquitted because he had reported to his superiors, who also failed to go to police. The Catholic Education Office is standing by its decision to give the former principal supply work in another diocese. It comes as the church and some of the affected families reach agreement on compensation. Annie Guest is speaking here to the communications manager for Brisbane Catholic Education, John Phelan. JOHN PHELAN: The issue here is that whilst the principal was dismissed from his role as a principal in Toowoomba, effectively for a failure of his management skills and processes, what he's been employed to do on a casual basis in a school in Ipswich has been simply to work as a relief teacher or a supply teacher when another teacher has been sick. So it's an entirely different situation from the role that he held in Toowoomba. ANNIE GUEST: You acknowledge that he should have reported these serious allegations of abuse to police and did not report them. You acknowledge that he should have. JOHN PHELAN: Of course he should have reported them. ANNIE GUEST: Yet the church has re-hired a former principal who didn't think it was necessary to report allegations of abuse to police. JOHN PHELAN: I think you're being a little unfair there, he believed as I understand it, he believed that his obligation, his requirement, was to report it to his superiors, which he did. It appears he did not understand at that time that he was required himself to report it to the police. He felt his superiors were the people to do that. ANNIE GUEST: And we should note they also lost their jobs. JOHN PHELAN: That's correct, that's correct. ANNIE GUEST: Has the church also given his former superiors who lost their jobs, jobs elsewhere? JOHN PHELAN: Certainly they have not been employed within the Brisbane Archdiocese, I have no idea where they are or what they might be doing. ANNIE GUEST: Would it be appropriate if they were also re-deployed? JOHN PHELAN: I think that's a different situation and we'd need to look at the specifics of that case. This is the case in terms of the principal that we've dealt with. I'm not going to speculate on other people's involvement. ANNIE GUEST: There were a lot of allegations put to this principal and he did admit that he reasonably suspected that his colleague, the teacher, Gerard Byrnes, had sexually abused at least one child. Is it really appropriate that someone with that opinion and fails to go to the police is now re-deployed and I ask you again, what do you say to the families of the victims? JOHN PHELAN: I can only repeat, my understanding of the situation in Toowoomba is that the principal followed what he thought was the correct process. Again, he is not in a position in the casual work that he's now doing in a Catholic school to be in that situation again. He is not a principal, he has not sought to apply for a job as a principal and I don't think we would appoint him to that role because of the previous history with the problems with his management. But he is working simply as a casual teacher in a classroom. ANNIE GUEST: Would it have been the case that when he was sacked, when he lost his job as the principal that he would have been told, we'll have some other work for you somewhere in the Catholic education system? JOHN PHELAN: I doubt that very much, because that's not the way in which the Catholic Church now operates. SHANE MCLEOD: Brisbane Catholic Education's John Phelan speaking to Annie Guest.
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