Monks lost control of one of Britain's leading Catholic schools Wednesday as a report into a 40-year child abuse scandal was published.
The independent inquiry was launched following allegations against abbey members stretching back decades. According to campaigners, those affected may number in the hundreds.
St Benedict’s abbot Martin Shipperlee commissioned the independent review before the Vatican announced it had ordered a separate inquiry into historic sex offences.
It was published a day after the High Court ruled that the Catholic Church can be held liable for the wrongdoings of its priests.
Lord Carlile’s report, which the peer unveiled alongside the head of St Benedict’s, Christopher Cleugh, was commissioned by the abbey to examine how to improve child protection.
A number of monks and teachers at Ealing Abbey and the neighbouring independent school in west London have been linked to alleged abuse from as far back as the
1960s.
In October 2009, a Catholic priest referred to as the “devil in a dog collar” was jailed for eight years over a string of sex attacks on boys at St Benedict’s.
Father David Pearce was jailed at Isleworth Crown Court after pleading guilty to a series of indecent assaults and sexual attacks on five young boys, four under 14, over a period of 36 years.
Police have also revealed they were hunting Father Laurence Soper over allegations of child abuse dating back to when he taught at St Benedict’s.
Soper, who was abbot of Ealing Abbey from 1991 to 2000, failed to return to a police station for questioning.
He is believed to have been living in a monastery in Rome but was due to return to London to answer bail in March.
He failed to show up and police are looking for him, with possibilities of a European arrest warrant being issued if he is thought to be somewhere in Europe.
Parents gathered at the school last night to hear the head give his response to the report.
In what a parent described as a heated meeting, which lasted for more than an hour and a half, parents asked what the school intended to do to prevent similar incidents in future.
Speaking after the meeting, Philip Catterall, whose 11-year-old son attends the school, said that the report’s findings were “very, very shocking”.
He said: “There were some tough questions for both the head and the abbot — some very hard questions.
“There was anger in the meeting ... there were some raised voices. Not shouting, I would say, but certainly some very direct, angry questions.
“There’s a bit of uncertainty and anxiousness about what else may come up because this obviously doesn’t put the school in a good light.”
But he added that “most parents felt at the end pretty positive”.
Another parent, Manoj Prakash, said: “Parents want to know more about what is going to be put in place to protect the children.
“All the parents are very concerned: will the new policies in place be practised and are they enough to protect the children?
“The school is very clear that changes will come and take effect and I think parents who are not happy about it can move children outside the school.”