STAFF at a children’s charity have been accused of sexually abusing dozens of young people in their care over the last six decades.

 

Barnardo's, one of the UK's largest children's charities, has formally accepted abuse had taken place as disquieting practices previously carried out across the country were starkly outlined.

 

Barnardo's said children were groomed for abuse by people connected to their homes and this led to a conviction.

 

An unnamed priest, a visiting vicar and other children were among those also accused of abusing children in Barnardo's care.

 

Abuse appeared to go unchecked because home superintendents were all-powerful in the eyes of the children who had nowhere to turn or help.

 

The Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry heard that parents were seen as an “irritant” to Barnardo’s staff once a child was put in care, siblings were split up, and contact with family discouraged.

 

Vulnerable children, many of whom were from troubled backgrounds, were told they were “coming into the largest family in the world”.

 

Instead of the shroud of protection expected of a family, however, many said they were sexually and physically abused at Barnardo’s which ran seven homes under scrutiny by the inquiry.

 

Of 3,600 children in care in Scotland since the end of the Second World War, 44 made official allegations of abuse.

 

One staff member has already been convicted in 2004 of sexual and physical abuse of two boys in Glasclune Home, North Berwick, East Lothian, dating back to the 1970s.

 

Asked by James Peoples, inquiry senior counsel, about the practices leading to the investigations into the allegations, Sara Clarke, senior assistant director, children's services at Barnardo's, said the "decisions of individual staff members are not indicative of systemic failure".

 

However, she added: "There is a recognition that we didn't always get it right.

 

"There are things we would have done differently and things we wish we had done and things we wouldn't have done."

 

In answer to questions about the allegations, she said police would not generally pursue a case where the accused is dead or the time lapse of an alleged historical time crime was considerable.

 

She also said that police north and south of the border pursued historical abuse cases more vigorously “post-Savile”.