With the full backing of my MP, I could now take my complaint to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman

26 November 2015

Parliamentary Ombudsman

Saville Abuse Victim

I am writing to you as I have reached the end of the process with my complaint to Jeremy Hunt MP and the Department of Health, as my family are unaware I am a victim, please treat all correspondence as confidential and all replies must be via my email address above.

I have the full backing of my MP Fabian Hamilton who recently said “the Secretary of State has not been as helpful as he initially appeared to be when I first wrote to him about your case. After Kate Lampard's report, Jeremy Hunt seemed to lose interest, which is very distressing. I hope that I was clear I would not give up on your case as I believed in you and in every word you have ever told me. I will stand by that and I will challenge the outcome of the LGI enquiry team and will write again to Jeremy Hunt as you requested – and as I should have done straight away. I will also pursue – as you have asked – your formal complaint to the Department of Health and your request to be re-instated as a child victim of Savile.” Fabian has also raised this matter in the House of Commons see extract from Hansard 26 February 2015;

Fabian Hamilton (Leeds North East) (Lab): I was Savile’s Member of Parliament and, as the Secretary of State can imagine, Leeds North East has its fair share of his victims. One such victim approached me recently in great distress. He had been abused as a child by Savile and had given his story to the police after decades, but it was not a complete story. When he was subsequently interviewed by NHS staff, they did not believe his story because it was inconsistent, owing to the fear that he had felt over the decades following the abuse. Will the Secretary of State reassure my constituent and the many others like him that they will not become victims twice?

Mr Hunt: The hon. Gentleman makes an important point, and I have great sympathy for his constituent. The information was not collated centrally. There were a number of reports about which we might have been sceptical if we had read them in isolation, but when we read them together with other reports, we see a pattern and we can conclude, as the investigation has done, that those incidents did indeed take place. That is one of the big learning points: we have to collate information that different victims provide at different times, to ensure that proper judgments can be made and that action can be taken.

For the avoidance of any doubt whatsoever, when I was 12 years old I was;

·        Groomed by Savile on the premises of Leeds General Infirmary

·        Sexually assaulted by Savile on two occasions (once in the grounds of St James’s Hospital)

·        A witness to Savile sexually abusing a dead woman and physically assaulted by Saville on the premises of Leeds General Infirmary causing life long suffering

I have required 40 sessions of Psychoanalytic Psychiatric care which I had to organise myself

I have at hand a library of documents which I will make available to you on request, these include;

·        My police statement

·        My voluntary interview with the LGI investigation team which they recorded

·        My witness statement prepared by my solicitor

·        My letter explaining the circumstances of my case to Jeremy Hunt MP

·        A letter from Jeremy Hunt advising he rejects my claim (which I received after my letter)

·        All correspondence between myself the DoH, Kate Lampard and Fabian Hamilton MP

·        Lockout letter from the Department of Health

Finally I remind you that Jeremy Hunt MP stated to the house in February this year that the victims of Saville were brave and must be believed, clearly this has not happened in my case. Jeremy Hunt and the DoH have rejected my claim. They have advised this is based upon on the grounds that Kate Lampard’s enquiry team claim I cannot have witnessed Savile with a dead woman as all hospitals had procedures in place to prevent such an incident. The DoH are now requesting that as I cannot prove to them I was a victim I have only one option, to take the department to the high court.

Extracts from Hansard 26 June 2014

Mr Hunt: At the time, the victims who spoke up were not believed, and it is important today that we all publicly recognise the truth of what they have said, but it is a profoundly uncomfortable truth. Penny Mordaunt (Portsmouth North) (Con): It is clear from the Portsmouth report that there were incidents with no corroborative evidence of the abuse. In one local case, the complainant was unconscious at the time of the alleged incident and learned of it from a hospital cleaner who witnessed it. Does my right hon. Friend agree that “no proof” is not the same as “it did not happen”, that his welcome words of apology should apply to all those who think they may have been abused and that we need a clear process for how such unprovable complaints can be dealt with?

Mr Hunt: Absolutely right. The case that my hon. Friend mentions was a real tragedy because that person suffered very real psychological harm in subsequent years as a result of what they were told by the cleaner. There are two points. First, we cannot necessarily corroborate, but we can see a pattern. What is impressive about these investigations is the fact that the investigators say time after time that although it is not possible to prove that these things happened, they believe that they did happen because the evidence was credible. On one or two occasions, they say that they are not sure, but in the vast majority of cases, they thought that the evidence was credible. Secondly, there will continue to be times when offences are alleged, but it is not possible to prove them in a court of law. The big lesson to be learnt is that that does not mean no action should be taken. We must do what it takes to protect patients.

Mr Hunt: But today, above all, we should remember the victims of Savile. They were brave. They have been vindicated. He was a coward. He has been disgraced. The system failed to prevent him from abusing. It failed to act when people spoke up. We must not allow history to repeat itself.

Mr Hunt: The letter I sent to NHS England this morning asks it to make sure that all the lessons are learned from the reports, and it includes the very clear suggestion—I want the NHS to interpret my letter in this way—that it should ensure that it commissions the support needed for children in these circumstances so that they get the very support that is necessary. This is not just about encouraging people to speak out; it is about making sure that when they do, they feel listened to and supported.

Signed

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