Charity allowed paedophile suspects to live at children's care home

QUARRIERS, Scotland's most prestigious children's charity, is facing ruin after a Sunday Herald investigation revealed that the organisation is knowingly renting homes to paedophiles and suspected child molesters within a community housing profoundly disabled children. The revelations have led to calls that Quarriers' chief executive, Phil Robinson, resign.

Parents of children at Quarriers Village have described Robinson's conduct as a "massive breach of trust". They say the charity's reputation is destroyed and it is impossible for Quarriers to continue. The Scottish Executive has also said it is seriously concerned.

The Quarriers Village in Bridge of Weir in Renfrewshire is a network of cottages providing residential care for disabled children.

Some cottages are no longer used as care facilities and have been sold or rented out. One was rented to John Porteous, who was jailed on Thursday for eight years for sexually abusing two boys. Robinson knew that Porteous was under investigation by the police but allowed him to remain in his rented flat.

Robinson also deliberately withheld information about Porteous from parents. Another man, who the Sunday Herald has not named for legal reasons, is also currently living in the village - unknown to parents but with Robinson's knowledge - despite having appeared in court in June for 13 child sexual offences. Both Porteous and the other man are former employees at the village.

Robinson said: "I don't agree that parents should have been informed on the basis of suspicions alone we had a duty not to disregard the presumption that someone is innocent until proven guilty."

Responding to claims that parents' trust was betrayed, Quarriers spokesman Colin Adams said: "What about betraying the trust of a man who had not been convicted?"

Nicola Sturgeon, SNP community care spokesman, said Robinson and the board of management should immediately resign. "Their actions are an unforgivable and serious dereliction of duty," she said.

A relative of a disabled child who attends Quarriers Village said: "We are left with a gaping hole where our trust once was. We need to know if these men could have had any access to our child. It is all but impossible to think of ever sending our child back there again."

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