UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian
Sandra Laville
Wednesday 11 November 2015
An ambitious project to take testimony from thousands of victims of child abuse across the country will begin within days as part of an independent inquiry into institutionalised abuse.
The Truth project, set up by the Goddard inquiry into child abuse, will begin pilot hearings in Liverpool next Tuesday, where it will take evidence in private from victims in the north-west and north Wales. The commission said regional offices elsewhere in the country would be set up afterwards to take testimony from other victims.
It is hoped that the project – which is similar to one undertaken by the Australian Royal Commission – will provide a broader picture of the scale and nature of institutional child abuse. Anonymised accounts of the hearings will be published when the inquiry reports.
Justice Lowell Goddard, the chair of the inquiry, travelled to Liverpool on Wednesday to open the Truth project. She met staff from Merseyside Rape and Sexual Abuse support centre (Rasa) and Stepping Stones, based in north Wales, which support victims of child sexual abuse and will be providing support and advocacy for victims at the hearings.
“The Truth project will enable victims and survivors of child sexual abuse to contribute to the work of the inquiry,” Goddard said. “It will help us gain a better understanding of the patterns of abuse, and will assist in explaining why many crimes went unreported and undetected for so long, often leaving other children at risk of abuse in later years.”
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.