Child Sex Abuse Royal Commission: Former Anglicare SA Chief Executive Failed to Report Abuse on Solicitor's Advice

By Selina Ross
ABC News
February 4, 2016

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-02-04/ex-anglicare-ceo-failed-to-report-abuse-on-solicitors-advice/7139128

The royal commission sitting is examining the Anglican Church and its youth group, the Church of England Boys Society (CEBS).

Among those of interest to the royal commission is convicted paedophile Robert Brandenburg, a former Adelaide youth leader, who was accused of abusing up to 200 young boys inolved with the CEBS.

The hearing today heard from Brandenburg's former boss, former Anglicare SA chief executive Gerard Menses, regarding his response to complaints about Brandenburg.

The royal commission heard that in the late 1990s, Mr Menses interviewed his then-employee Brandenburg about allegations he had taken boys alone to camp sites.

That was three years after Mr Menses had held a disciplinary meeting with Brandenburg over him bathing naked in a spa with a 10-year-old boy.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse heard that during the 1998 interview, Mr Menses asked Brandenburg directly if he had engaged in paedophilic behaviour.

Counsel assisting the commissioner Naomi Sharp put to Mr Menses that nowhere in Brandenburg's lengthy response to the question did he deny that he had engaged in paedophile activities.

Mr Menses agreed that was the case.

"I accept that I should have been more astute in listening to what he said," he replied.

Mr Menses said he sought advice from a solicitor about the incident and was told he did not need to do anything further.

Mr Menses told the hearing in Hobart he made an error of judgment in following his lawyer's advice.

"I accept that I should not have slavishly followed that advice, I should have heard that advice and then made up my own mind," he said.

"I accept that that was a mistake."

Former bishop's son denies abuse jokes were made

Earlier, the son of a former Anglican bishop of Tasmania told the inquiry he did not believe earlier evidence that jokes about child sexual abuse were told around his family's dinner table.

The commission has heard evidence that former bishop Philip Newell's sons would joke about CEBS camps and abuser Louis Daniels.

Philip Newell was Bishop of the Diocese of Tasmania from 1982 until his retirement in 2000.

A woman who dated Mr Newell's eldest son in the 1980s earlier told the inquiry the sons would talk about Daniels and CEBS members with "sore bottoms".

On Monday, Phillip Newell denied that was the case, saying it was "not an expression that would that would have been at all acceptable".

Appearing by video link on Thursday, his son Michael Newell told the hearing his mother called him about Monday's evidence.

Counsel assisting Naomi Sharp asked Michael Newell if his mother had wanted to know whether he remembered such statements.

"I don't know that she used those exact words, but she didn't need to," he said.

"I basically said that I did not believe that those statements ... those statements were not made."

Dr Newell was asked if he was giving evidence to protect his father.

He rejected that was the case.

"I do not believe my brother said those words," he said.

"It was not within his nature and character."

Dr Newell said the statement was inconsistent with his late brother's life as an ethicist.

"To be perfectly honest, I was a little offended those words had been put in the mouth of my dead brother," he said.

Michael Newell's brother Peter has also told the commission the comment was never made.