Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

This section was setup in August 2018 in order to move the existing related discussions from other sections into this new section to group them together, and separate from the other CH-related topics.

Moderator: Moderators

dsmg
UF (Upper Fourth)
Posts: 90
Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2010 2:55 pm
Real Name: daniel

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by dsmg »

I presume he's referring to the charge
Play up Pompey!
TMF
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 149
Joined: Mon Jul 07, 2014 6:03 am
Real Name: TMF

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by TMF »

dsmg wrote: Tue Sep 11, 2018 10:13 pm I presume he's referring to the charge
Indeed, and the people abetting abuse (i.e. not reporting it because there was no legal compulsion to do so) were a corporal punishment enthusiast and a racist who was involved in scouting. Nothing to worry about here...
robert totterdell
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 139
Joined: Mon Jun 25, 2018 4:58 pm
Real Name: Mr Robert G S Totterdell

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by robert totterdell »

OK - firstly the police are fully aware that Gregory & Lorrimer knew what was going on and NEITHER of them committed any form of sexual abuse.

The point that I was trying to make was that there was knowledge within the school but it may have been extremely difficult for persons to bring the matter forward to higher authorities.

Gregory & Lorrimer got me away from Burr, along with Carrington and they did know why.

If Gregory was a proto mentor to me Ron Lorrimer was my first true mentor - but that does mean they were always right in what they said or did.

Please remember that we are all human!
DazedandConfused
Deputy Grecian
Posts: 274
Joined: Wed Jun 20, 2018 7:20 pm
Real Name: J

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by DazedandConfused »

Carrington knew?
yamaha
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 199
Joined: Wed Dec 23, 2009 5:27 pm

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by yamaha »

Hi Robert, I hesitate to comment, but I think you show remarkable forbearance to Gregory and Lorrimer.

Burr was not convicted until January this year "for nine counts of indecently assaulting the boys aged between 11 and 14 at Christ’s Hospital between 1969 and 1973" (to quote the news report).

Therefore, there were 8 more victims and a delay almost 50 years before he was brought before a court.

If Gregory and Lorrimer had fulfilled their duty and behaved with a reasonable degree of humanity they would not only have got you away from Burr, they would have had him arrested.
robert totterdell
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 139
Joined: Mon Jun 25, 2018 4:58 pm
Real Name: Mr Robert G S Totterdell

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by robert totterdell »

Come on chaps - Gregory was useless as a teacher and did beat people but remember he was a war hero to an extent. He did the Artic convoys where he was the only survivor of one ship and where he got his stutter. He then went onto do the Med, the Atlantic, and the Far East and he had more bl**dy medals than anyone at CH even though he didn't have a gown (so no degree which Burr took advantage of). Lorrimer was incredibly boring as a teacher but was not stupid and disliked Newsome (and I remember (with great delight) stood up to him). He was 'gay' but he understood the society that Newsome allowed to prevail.

I have posted something on the news that The Fab Five are no longer allowed to go onto the CHOBA site so please read.

In the end, although it was the masters who committed the crimes, and it was other masters who ubndoubatbly knew but turned their heads away, it is not those who I am concentrating on. It is the 'authorities' i.e. the Governing Councils over several periods and the Heads that I am looking at.

Who employed who?

Rob
robert totterdell
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 139
Joined: Mon Jun 25, 2018 4:58 pm
Real Name: Mr Robert G S Totterdell

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by robert totterdell »

Yup Yamaha, you are right.

They should have done something - I suspect over the 32 years covered, and the rest, there are a lot of teachers both male and female who could and should have done something.

There are many reasons why people don't do something. I am not defending them but then I didn't do anything, did I? And for that I will forever feel the guilt because if I had then perhaps the rot might have been stopped.

Whilst I have accepted people saying 'but if you had you would have been unbelieved, punished even expelled - and I know one boy was for complaining about Burr - ' I still must take on my own responsibility over many years for not saying anything and not doing anything. I now live with the guilt of the further damage down to other pupils of the school. I shied away and didn't have the courage.

I am trying to the very best of my ability to make up for that now - too little and too late but I will get things changed and I don't feel the current safeguarding is good enough and I've heard all of it from Jacqui & Simon the Business Manager and HM.

I will do my best and I hope with your support.
yamaha
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 199
Joined: Wed Dec 23, 2009 5:27 pm

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by yamaha »

Rob, John Stuart Mill, said: “Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.”
As an army officer you will know that the “befehl ist befehl” – superior orders - defense was not allowed at Nuremberg and it shouldn’t be allowed in mandatory reporting of child abuse.

Everyone with any knowledge has a moral duty to report such activities or allegations to help prevent further offenses as well as for justice and that should be made a law.

It is for properly trained people to decide if there is a case to be answered, not colleagues of the accused or school governors who are inescapably influenced by factors other than child welfare and justice.

Never doubt that you have enormous support and that we will do anything to help.


Edit: Rob, You must not blame yourself for anything.
I will write to IICSA in support of your initiative to enact mandatory reporting and hopefully others will too.
michael scuffil
Button Grecian
Posts: 1612
Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2007 12:53 pm
Real Name: michael scuffil
Location: germany

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by michael scuffil »

I hadn't realized Burr's case went back to Newsome's time. I knew Newsome fairly well from Cambridge, and I imagine no one's suggesting he had any knowledge of this, because it would have been out of character for him to have known and done nothing.
As for Gregory and Lorrimer: if they knew, they should have told Newsome. Gregory in particular I would have thought commanded a degree of respect (which Lorrimer for a long time didn't, in my day he was seen as a clown). Going straight to the police would have gone against the ethos of the time, and for us 50 years later it is too easy to say that they should have done. But Gregory was there with Pink and Buck and Grice, and had witnessed their departure; he would have known he wouldn't be risking his career, he was a far more senior member of staff than Burr.
Th.B. 27 1955-63
TMF
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 149
Joined: Mon Jul 07, 2014 6:03 am
Real Name: TMF

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by TMF »

Webb's responsibilities were changed during Newsome's time immediately after the chanting incident in the dining hall in the late 1970s. It is unlikely that Newsome was not aware of this sequence of events.
Golfer
GE (Great Erasmus)
Posts: 183
Joined: Sat Jul 07, 2018 5:13 pm
Real Name: Tim Askew

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by Golfer »

FIrst I'd like to apologize to anyone on this threat to whom I have caused offence.

Having said that my problems with this thread were as follows:

1) Current statutory regulations make it a requirement of all teachers to snitch on each other if a child's safety is at stake, on pain of dismissal. Seems to me that this environment makes abuse unlikely - especially when combined with senior management using the eyes and ears of the pupils to pass on information, which in the light of the transformation of views as a result of the Jimmy Savile stuff is going to happen.
2) As an historian I can note that the legal concept of misprision has gradually vanished from some countries and is only kept alive in the UK in relation to treason cases - themselves outdated and related to when we mattered in the world as an Empire.
3) I suspect that the decline of the legal concept of misprision is linked to the rise of individual rights and the difficulties of keeping the concept limited - ie it would impact on so many jobs, professions, callings that it would discourage people from - say - public service. But it is not my role to assess this - the legal people on this site can provide more expert comment.

So overall I would say that that idea that misprision has a place in future legislation or cases is highly unlikely and shouldn't be pursued by this site with any confidence.
User avatar
postwarblue
Deputy Grecian
Posts: 409
Joined: Mon May 21, 2007 12:12 pm
Real Name: Robert Griffiths
Location: Havant

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by postwarblue »

1. My understanding is that the original offence was 'misprision of felony' and when the term 'felony' was abolished by Callaghan(?) the baby misprision went down the plug hole with the felony bath water.

2. It is surely sophistry to suggest that if teachers had no legal duty to 'snitch' (a word whose use suggests that this issue is still not being taken seriously) then no account need be taken of a teacher's assuredly MORAL duty to do everything he can to protect juveniles in his care (and to demonstrate a bit of moral courage in doing so).

3. Poulton's warped priorities and apparent want of moral compass are completely exposed in one sentence of his quoted on the CHOBA thread.
'Oh blest retirement, friend to life's decline'
User avatar
Mid A 15
Button Grecian
Posts: 3172
Joined: Thu May 19, 2005 1:38 pm
Real Name: Claude Rains
Location: The Patio Of England (Kent)

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by Mid A 15 »

A trivial point I appreciate given the awful matters we are discussing.

However Ron was Lorimer not Lorrimer.
Ma A, Mid A 65 -72
charlesr
2nd Former
Posts: 20
Joined: Sat Jul 14, 2018 10:30 am
Real Name: Charles Rogers

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by charlesr »

Golfer wrote: Thu Sep 13, 2018 6:44 pm .....
1) Current statutory regulations make it a requirement of all teachers to snitch on each other if a child's safety is at stake, on pain of dismissal. Seems to me that this environment makes abuse unlikely - especially when combined with senior management using the eyes and ears of the pupils to pass on information, which in the light of the transformation of views as a result of the Jimmy Savile stuff is going to happen.
.....
We seem to be going round in circles here. There is *no* statutory duty on anyone to report child abuse or neglect. The Government consulted (in 2016) on a proposal to introduce mandatory reporting and/or a duty to act. The conclusion (published in March 2018) was that:
the Government believes that the case for a mandatory reporting duty or duty to act has not currently been made. Therefore, we do not intend to introduce a mandatory reporting duty or duty to act at this time
That is not to say that the current safeguarding environment is not much more likely to expose abuse than the position which existed at CH and elsewhere in the past, but it's not correct to say there is a legal duty.
Charles Rogers (LHA 67-70; ThB 70-75)
rockfreak
Grecian
Posts: 972
Joined: Sun Apr 06, 2014 8:31 pm
Real Name: David Redshaw
Location: Saltdean, East Sussex

Re: Why a teacher DOES NOT have to report abuse

Post by rockfreak »

My own experience of Gregory. I was in the Prep houses when Gregory was there. He was presiding over our dorm one evening when one young lad had committed some minor misdemeanor. He was due for the slipper. He came out of the lav-ends wearing just his jim-jam bottoms. Gregnut (as we called him) bent him over and administered a very brutal slippering. The poor lad subsided onto his bed in fits of tears. Just to rub it in Gregory shouted at him that he was a "milksop". He clearly enjoyed the humiliation of this kid as well. It may be that "Gregnut" was a war hero but others who experienced war have not always reacted in the same way. Some of those poets and writers who experienced the trenches in the first war went in the other direction to become pacifists. Maybe "Gregnut" was just one of nature's fascists and maybe the English boarding school was his natural habitat.
Post Reply