New Zealand Royal Commission: parents trusted a Presbyterian minister with their daughters 'because he was a Minister', and Berhampore Home had no system to monitor children's care

Proceedings

1. 2024-07-24 · final report presented to Parliament

   Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care (Aotearoa New Zealand). The Inquiry recorded NZ European and Māori survivor Ms NI, 'one of many survivors who spoke to this Inquiry about abuse suffered by a Presbyterian Minister', who explained: 'There was so little supervision of what was happening [at the youth group where abuse occurred] by the Church. Parents trusted [the Minister] to look after us girls too because he was a Minister' (¶604). Ms NI was abused by a Presbyterian reverend while attending youth group and youth camps in the 1970s, and told the Inquiry her mother did not believe her when she disclosed (¶617). On institutional oversight, the Inquiry found that at Berhampore Home, open from 1909 to 1985, the Chief Executive of Presbyterian Support Central acknowledged that from the records there were no reporting systems in place for the board or management to monitor the care of children and young people despite abuse and neglect occurring, and that this lack of reporting systems 'was one reason why abuse and neglect were able to continue, unchecked and often without consequences' (¶691).

Documented coercion mechanisms

• ministerial status as the reason parents entrusted their daughters to him
• absence of any reporting system by which the board or management could monitor children's care