04-11-2014, 09:33 AM
May has refused to consider Michael Mansfield QC as the inquiry chairman, who the survivor groups want, and seems set not to give wide ranging powers to the inquiry to force attendance and the release of documents - although she says she is still open to allowing this (but hasn't, of course -- and dar I suggest, she never will either).
Apart from that she, laughably, says she's committed to delivering justice. What complete bollocks.
Apart from that she, laughably, says she's committed to delivering justice. What complete bollocks.
Quote:Theresa May apologises to survivors for failure to find abuse inquiry chairman
Home secretary promises to meet with abuse survivors at regional events, and to continue the hunt for a new candidate
- Alan Travis home affairs editor
- The Guardian, Monday 3 November 2014 17.54 GMT
Theresa May apologises for failure to appoint a child abuse inquiry chair. Source: ITN
The home secretary, Theresa May, has apologised to survivors that four months after she promised to set up an inquiry into historical child abuse she has yet to find a chairman who commands their confidence.
May made a moving appeal to survivors to share her determination to get to the truth and finally deliver justice, and announced that she will personally meet them next week to consult over the hunt for a new chairman.
"It's obviously very disappointing that we do not now have an inquiry panel chairman. For that I want to tell survivors that I'm sorry," she told MPs, who widely commended her for the tone of her statement.
"Together, we can expose what has gone wrong in the past," she told survivors. "We can prevent it going wrong in the future. We can make sure that people who thought they were beyond the reach of the law face justice," said May. "Let us come together to make this process work and finally deliver justice for what you and too many others have suffered."
The home secretary was making a Commons statement after her second nominated chairman, Fiona Woolf, resigned last Friday after she failed to command the widespread support of victims.
May outlined a series of steps to restore confidence in the inquiry after the departure of both Fiona Woolf, and her predecessor as nominated chair, Baroness Butler-Sloss.
She said that she would start holding meetings with representatives of survivors next week and would hold six further regional events to give them the opportunity to give evidence without going to London. Evidence from survivors will also be taken remotely via video link to enable them to testify from the privacy of their own homes.
She told the Commons that the Wanless inquiry into the Home Office's handling of child abuse allegations in the 1980s known as Dickens's dossier' will be published next week.
She acknowledged that it would "not be straightforward" to find a new chairman with both the necessary legal or child protection expertise and who has had "no contact at all with an institution or an individual about whom people have concerns".
But May insisted it was still possible to find a suitable candidate who could win the confidence of survivors and said she was willing to reopen a search for overseas candidates.
The home secretary stressed that the inquiry will operate as an eight-strong panel and said it would start work next week without its chairman and will meet every Wednesday between now and Christmas.
May confirmed that the door remains open for the investigation to be turned into a statutory inquiry with powers to require people to give evidence and papers to be disclosed.
She also told MPs that although the inquiry, which is expected to take at least three years and look at events going back to 1970, is restricted to England and Wales, she wanted to ensure that events in Northern Ireland, such as the Kincora allegations, and in Jersey do not slip through the gaps. She also said that a protocol is being drawn up to ensure that intelligence documents from the security services are provided to the panel.
May denied that she or her advisers had been involved in redrafting Fiona Woolf's seven letters to the Commons home affairs select committee on her links to the former home secretary, Lord Brittan.
Lawyer Alison Millar, head of the abuse team at Leigh Day, which is representing some of the survivors, said she was disappointed by the decision not to concede a statutory inquiry at this point.
"We welcome the home secretary's apology to the survivors for the mistakes made up to this point," she said.
"We agree that this inquiry represents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and welcome her more consultative approach on the future of the inquiry and to provide support for survivors.
"However, we are disappointed that the home secretary will not give the inquiry the statutory powers it needs to compel the production of documents and the attendance of witnesses, as well as to ensure that anyone who gives false evidence will face criminal sanctions.
"As this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, the model needs to be right from the onset," said Millar.
The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious of the shadow without considerable moral effort. To become conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real. This act is the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge.
Carl Jung - Aion (1951). CW 9, Part II: P.14