Child abuse royal commission: Former Ballarat Bishop Ronald Mulkearns apologises for his handling of abuse allegations

By Margaret Paul
ABC News
February 25, 2016

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Ronald Mulkearns appeared at the hearing via videolink from a nursing home.

A number of protesters gathered outside the hearing in Ballarat.

Former Catholic bishop Ronald Mulkearns has told a royal commission he is not sure if he knew child abuse was a crime during his time in charge of the Ballarat diocese, but he knew it was wrong.

The former bishop made his much-anticipated appearance at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse via videolink from the nursing home in which he now lives.

Until now Bishop Mulkearns had been excused from giving evidence because he was too sick.

Asked if he referred paedophile Gerald Ridsdale for help because he knew he was abusing children, he said yes.

Bishop Mulkearns told the hearing he never asked priests directly if they were abusers but instead got reports from psychologists.

He conceded the only reason he sent priests off for treatment was because he believed they had been offending.

"I didn't really know what to do or how to do it," he said.

He apologised on Thursday for the way he handled complaints of abuse in his diocese.

He told the Royal Commission he retired in 1997 because he did not feel he was "handling himself very well".

"There were problems with the priests in the diocese and I didn't seem to be handling them as well as I should have," he said.

"And I'd like to say if I may that I'm terribly sorry that I didn't do things differently in that time."

Abuse victim David Ridsdale said he was not satisfied with Bishop Mulkearns' apology.

"Apologies are words, and we haven't had the actions," he said.

"I think he showed everyone that the church has known for a long time."

He said he was looking forward to Bishop Mulkearns' evidence continuing.

He became the bishop of Ballarat in 1971 and oversaw the diocese during one of its darkest periods.

The hearing previously heard the former bishop received numerous complaints about paedophile priests over three decades but they were never referred to police.

It was told Bishop Mulkearns instead moved the priests around western Victoria where they continued to offend.

The hearing was adjourned after about 90 minutes due to Bishop Mulkearns' ill health. He will continue his evidence at a further date.

Counsel for the royal commission Gail Furness SC asked Bishop Mulkearns whether he valued the church's reputation over the welfare of the children in its care.

"You chose, in the way in which you dealt with complaints, to protect the reputation of the church over protecting children within the diocese didn't you?" she asked.

"No that wasn't completely true," he replied.

"I certainly wanted to protect the reputation of the church, I wanted to make sure these incidents didn't happen in the future and I tried my best to work in such a way that it wouldn't happen in the future."

But he said that was difficult because the offenders "didn't tell the truth" about the abuse.

Ms Furness put it to Bishop Mulkearns that the church had four experts, including a psychiatrist and a psychologist, on hand to treat paedophile priests in the 1970s.

"You must have known you had a pretty big problem on your hands Bishop, if you had four people available to you, including one institute in the states, to deal with priests offending against children, isn't that right?" she asked him.

"Well, I simply can't remember anything about these things, but yes," Bishop Mulkearns replied.

But he said he could not remember specific details of cases, including when he knew former priest Paul David Ryan was abusing boys in northern Victoria.