Abuse inquiry member tells committee she ‘was bullied’

A member of the independent panel into child sexual abuse has told MPs she has been “bullied” by the barrister conducting the embattled inquiry.

Home Secretary Theresa May set up the inquiry to find out whether public bodies had neglected or covered up allegations of child sex abuse in the wake of claims paedophiles had operated in Westminster in the 1980s.

Panel member Sharon Evans (pictured), a child abuse survivor and chief executive of the Dot Com Children’s Foundation, which helps prevent children from becoming victims of violence or abuse, told the Home Affairs Select Committee she felt “bullied” by counsel to the inquiry Ben Emmerson QC.

Ms Evans said Mr Emmerson was “overstepping the mark” with his advice, including demands she re-write letters sent to the Home Secretary and agreed he was “running the show”.

Chair of the committee Keith Vaz asked Ms Evans about reported concerns she had over alleged threats made by Mr Emmerson in respect of evidence she would give to the Committee.

Ms Evans said: “I do feel concerned, very concerned, yes.”

She went on: “I believe I have been called here today – I was appointed, I was told, as the media person for the independent panel and to help understand a survivor perspective and I feel that I was told today that we must speak with a collective voice.

“I feel that would prevent me from answering some of your questions honestly.”

Ms Evans said she was concerned about the “independence” of the inquiry in relation to advice she had received from one adviser, adding that letters she had sent to the Home Secretary had been re-written by him.

“I felt very bullied,” she told the Committee. “He was overstepping the mark with advice and re-writing of letters.”

Mr Vaz started the session by reminding the panel members it would be a contempt of the house for anyone to threaten them over evidence they wanted to give to the Committee.

Ms Evans was joined by panel members Drusilla Sharpling, Professor Jenny Pearce and Professor Alexis Jay.

The inquiry was announced in July but still has no chairman, following the resignations of the Government’s first two choices, and doubts remain over plans to give it extra powers.

Previous appointments as inquiry chairwomen Fiona Woolf and Baroness Butler-Sloss resigned following claims about their perceived closeness to establishment figures.

The Home Secretary revealed in a letter last month that she was considering standing down the current panel in favour of a royal commission or a new inquiry on statutory terms.

Panel member Jenny Pearce, Professor of Young People and Public Policy at the University of Bedfordshire, who was recently awarded the Queen’s Anniversary Prize for research on child sexual exploitation influencing safeguarding, told MPs the panel work must “carry on”.

She said: “The work must carry on, it’s a very important inquiry. The work of the inquiry must carry on.”

The Government insisted it still expected the panel to be up and running under its new chair by the end of March, when Parliament is dissolved ahead of the general election.

The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: “We want to get this right. We understand very much that concerns have been raised previously by victims and victims’ groups about the process that is being followed. We have been very clear in our determination to get that right.”

Asked if the panel would be established under the new chair by the end of March, the spokesman said: “I do think that you will see this set up in the coming period.”

Mr Emmerson said: “The effective operation of any public inquiry requires that panel members are able to hold full and frank discussions in confidence and take collective responsibility for their decisions. This is reflected in the terms of their appointment which provide that the unauthorised disclosure of confidential information is a breach of contract justifying immediate termination.

“Sharon Evans has repeatedly disclosed confidential information in public and has made a number of public statements that are factually misleading. These were serious violations of her duties as a panel member and undermine the integrity of the inquiry and the confidence of victims and survivors

“It was my clear duty as counsel to the inquiry to bring these breaches to the attention of the panel and the Home Office. I also pointed them out clearly to Ms Evans herself on a number of occasions, and it was this which led her to accuse me of bullying her.

“These allegations of bullying and intimidation are entirely baseless. As the Home Office will confirm, Ms Evans’ complaints have already been fully investigated and dismissed as unfounded, something she neglected to mention when she gave evidence to the Home Affairs Select Committee this afternoon.

“The advice that I gave Ms Evans was legally correct and entirely necessary in the circumstances.”

The panel later released a statement signed by seven out of eight members with Ms Evans being the only member not to put her name down.

It said: “Today we outlined that the work of the panel is under way.

“The panel has full confidence in the integrity, advice and impartiality of counsel to the Inquiry.

“We accept the advice provided was robust but do not accept any statements about bullying. We reject any suggestion that the panel has been intimidated.”

A Home Office spokesman said: “During her appearance before the Home Affairs Committee today, Sharon Evans said she had made a complaint to the Home Office about Ben Emmerson’s conduct.

“The Home Office can confirm that this complaint was investigated and no evidence of bullying was found. The Home Office has complete confidence in Ben Emmerson QC as counsel to the inquiry.”

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