Child Home Chief Suspended Over Kerelaw Allegations

{mosimage} The head of Scotland’s flagship secure unit for under-16s has been suspended after being provisionally disqualified from working with children.

William McFadyen was sent home from St Philip’s School near Airdrie, Lanarkshire, after authorities were told of allegations made against him when he worked at Kerelaw, the Ayrshire residential unit closed earlier this year amid one of Scotland’s biggest-ever child abuse investigations.

Mr McFadyen is one of 17 former employees from Kerelaw referred to the Scottish Executive to be considered for disqualification from working with children by Glasgow City Council, which ran the Ayrshire school.

The council has already sacked 13 workers, two of whom were jailed for physically and sexually abusing children, and suspended several others after its own inquiries.

Glasgow City Council, however, was unable to look into allegations against the 17 because they no longer worked for the authority. The claims against Mr McFadyen have not yet been investigated.

Mr McFadyen, who was deputy head of Kerelaw and in charge of its secure unit, left council employment in 2004 to take up his post at St Philip’s, which is managed by Cora, a Catholic charity, on behalf of the Scottish Executive.

Cora’s chairman, Monsignor Peter Smith, yesterday confirmed Mr McFadyen’s suspension.

He said: “Willie was provisionally placed on the disqualified-from-working-with-children list as a result of allegations dating from his time at Kerelaw.

“The law allows us to keep him at work when he is only provisionally on the list. Willie informed us himself immediately and said he would abide by whatever the board felt about the matter. He was suspended on November 6. I would emphasise that this has nothing to do with St Philip’s.”

Monsignor Smith said Cora, which employed several former Kerelaw staff, had carefully vetted all employees. He said: “We were not unaware of the difficulties that Kerelaw had encountered.”

The executive yesterday declined to confirm how many of the 17 former Kerelaw workers referred to the list had been formally disqualified, either provisionally or permanently.

Executive officials decide on whether to add names to the list, which was introduced in 2003 after the Soham murders. So far, 220 people have been referred to it by a variety of bodies, an executive spokeswoman said yesterday. Just 111 have been added permanently – people who will never again work with children.

Another 33, including Mr McFadyen, have been put on the list provisionally. They have the right to appeal. A spokesman for Glasgow City Council yesterday confirmed that it had passed names from Kerelaw on to the executive.

He said: “We have no basis to investigate anyone who is not an employee. We have a statutory duty to refer any uninvestigated allegations to the executive.”

The Care Commission, which is responsible for maintaining standards in institutions such as St Philip’s, said: “We have been notified that a member of senior management at the service has been suspended.”
Mr McFadyen was unavailable for comment.