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Complaints of abuse during the Dyson period

  35.17  Only two complainants of whom we know have made allegations of abuse that occurred in this period and both complained of being punched by a member of staff, one when he swore in front of other children and the other when he opened some curtains and the curtain rail fell down. Neither alleged that he was injured by being punched and the one whose evidence was read to the Tribunal said that he was fairly treated at Y Gwyngyll.

Complaints of abuse during the Hughes' regime

  35.18  It appears that 11 former residents of Y Gwyngyll between 1981 and 1986 made allegations to the police that they had been abused by identified members of the staff there or by Nefyn Dodd. Of these only two alleged that they had suffered sexual abuse and neither alleged that they had been abused in this way by Dodd. One was a former boy resident identified as D in paragraph 33.70 in the chapter on Ty'r Felin, who alleged that he was seduced when he was about 16 years old by a student member of the staff: she had been giving him the eye and making it obvious that she was attracted by him. Sexual intercourse occurred after he had gone downstairs to drink cider with her. On another occasion oral sex had occurred in a shower bath. He had bragged about it and the student had left shortly afterwards. D alleged also that he had sold a pornographic video that he had stolen to a male member of the staff.

  35.19  The other allegation of sexual abuse was by a former girl resident against a male member of the staff. She alleged that sexual intercourse occurred on two occasions with this man when she was at Y Gwyngyll but she did not complain until about eight years later and there was no corroboration then of her allegation. She did not provide the Tribunal with any evidence in support of her allegations.

  35.20  Of the remaining nine complainants who are former residents of Y Gwyngyll, all of whom alleged physical abuse of one kind or another, four gave oral evidence and we received written evidence from three of them. Each of the four claimed to have been struck by Nefyn Dodd. One, for example, who had been at Y Gwyngyll for nearly two years between 1983 and 1985, said that it was a bad experience because of Dodd. He said that Dodd used to smack him in the face and on the bottom for lying. He would be put over Dodd's knees with his trousers pulled down; the smacks would be quite hard and they made him cry. This happened on three or four occasions and he used to wet his bed in fear of Dodd. This witness alleged also that Hughes used to laugh when Dodd dealt with him. He did not get on with Hughes and did not like Hughes very much. Hughes "beat him up" a few times for being naughty but he did not see Hughes beat others up. There were some riots at Y Gwyngyll because residents were not being properly treated by staff.

  35.21  Another witness (who apparently has an IQ of 133) described Dodd as extremely big and overbearing. He complained of being told by Dodd to paint the mortar between bricks with an artist's brush. When he feigned illness the next day he was not given any food: he went down to tea but Dodd then screamed and swore at him in Welsh. On another occasion the witness went to the boot room to have a smoke but he was seen by Dodd, who grabbed him around the neck, frogmarched him, "belted" him in the stomach and then threw him upstairs.

  35.22  The other "live" witnesses complained respectively of being punched on the side of the face and to the floor by Dodd and of being hit by him over the head with a bunch of keys.

  35.23  Nefyn Dodd denied all these allegations and they were not supported by Hughes or any other member of the staff at Y Gwyngyll. Hughes' evidence to the Tribunal was that he did not see Dodd use any physical force to residents and that he himself neither used nor condoned physical punishment. On the question of sanctions generally, Hughes said that he did not impose punishments because be believed in counselling and thought that it worked excellently.

  35.24  Only two former residents of Y Gwyngyll alleged physical abuse by Hughes and both gave evidence to the Tribunal. One has been referred to already in paragraph 35.20. The other alleged that Hughes attacked him and threw him to the floor on one of the three or four occasions when the residents at Y Gwyngyll barricaded themselves in. This witness spent just over six months there in the first half of 1981 so that he was there when Hughes arrived and left before the latter became Officer-in-Charge. According to the witness, the residents were dissatisfied with conditions at the home and they protested also about the failure of the staff to take effective action against a particular bully, who was one of the residents at that time.

  35.25  Other allegations of physical abuse during Hughes' period were few in number and did not suggest any habitual use of force by staff. About six other members of the residential care staff were named by individual complainants to the police but only one of these complainants provided a written statement to the Tribunal and unhappily that was confused because of his drug addiction. One other complainant was unable to identify his assailant but alleged that he was thrown over a low wall by a trainee student after he had been cheeky to the student: he was winded but not otherwise injured and the student was dismissed from Y Gwyngyll shortly afterwards by Hughes, following an inquiry.

  35.26  It will be apparent from what we have said that we have not received any evidence of habitual or persistent abuse at Y Gwyngyll. Any incidents of sexual abuse that occurred were isolated and were not the subject of complaint (as distinct from bragging) until many years afterwards. As for the use of physical force, it is unlikely that most of the complaints would have surfaced but for the allegations against Nefyn Dodd. We accept that the latter did, on a limited number of occasions, use inappropriate and excessive physical force to residents at Y Gwyngyll but this was on a much lesser scale than at Ty'r Felin. In general, the residents were in awe of him because of his size, his personality and his loud voice; and he visited the home once a week usually. Other members of the staff rarely resorted to force and then only in provocative situations or when some form of physical restraint was necessary.

  35.27  In reaching our conclusions about the nature and extent of any abuse that occurred at Y Gwyngyll we have taken into account the evidence of a majority of the complainants who were there at the time that the regime under Hughes was very relaxed. That was how D, for example, described it and he said that the staff barely had an input. Another witness said that it was great, like a holiday home and yet another that the children were allowed to do what they wanted. A more critical former resident said that it was "a shambles" and that everyone ran riot.

  35.28  One of the curiosities of this history is that, although Dodd may have been critical of Hughes' outlook and methods, he does not appear to have interfered with the regime until (perhaps) a late stage. Harvey regarded himself as a strict disciplinarian, according to his own written statement, but he was replaced by Gadd, whose own account of the Hughes regime was that there were few rules and that sometimes you would think that the residents were running the home.

The quality of care generally

  35.29  Although the level of any sexual or physical abuse by staff at Y Gwyngyll was low, the general quality of care provided there left much to be desired. We have already described in the introduction to this chapter how the first period of about two and a half years in the home's history culminated in the complaints investigated by the Dyfed team[507]. The report by that team was highly critical but it was not seen by Hughes when he took over as Officer-in-Charge, nor was he given a summary of its main relevant conclusions. D A Parry disappeared from the residential child care scene shortly afterwards and no one took over those responsibilities at such a high level. Day to day control and supervision were vested in Nefyn Dodd but there was little direction from above and no strategic planning.

  35.30  Hughes told the Tribunal in his evidence that, as Officer-in-Charge atY Gwyngyll, he felt a lack of support from headquarters and professional supervision; he was conscious also of the lack of a corporate strategy. His impression was that he and the residential care staff were being left "to keep a lid on" the problems surrounding troublesome youngsters whilst higher management washed their hands of them.

  35.31  Hughes voiced some of his dissatisfactions at the end of 1984 with the result that he had a number of meetings between January and early March 1985, mainly with Gethin Evans[508] but also involving the Deputy Director of Social Services (Glanville Owen) and Nefyn Dodd. Parts of the discussions related to Hughes' career wishes and need not be repeated here. His criticisms of the administration of residential care, however, were countered with criticisms of his own performance; and there were contemporaneous exchanges of memoranda and letters.

  35.32  It appears from the correspondence that incidents of damage at Y Gwyngyll had occurred in the last two months of 1984 and that Hughes was feeling the strain of being called out to the home frequently; in his view, the situation had worsened after the arrival of Gadd, who "avoided contacts with residents and was over tired when he came on duty". Hughes wished to explore reasons why Y Gwyngyll had not been a success and suggested that folklore in the local community militated against it, that its location was unsuitable and created problems and that the design of the home did not allow for close supervision or experiment.

  35.33  Nefyn Dodd himself produced a three page memorandum at this time, dated 21 January 1985, under the heading "Main Difficulties with the Management of Y Gwyngyll". In that memorandum he said, amongst other things, that:

(1)  There had been no planned admissions to Y Gwyngyll or any other community home: such admissions as had occurred had been in response to emergencies.

(2)  There were children at Y Gwyngyll who were potentially violent and destructive; due to their general demeanour and anti-authority levels of functioning they could not be considered for fostering or adoption.

(3)  The lack of employment possibilities further complicated a difficult situation.

(4)  The location of the home was not conducive to good neighbourly relations and a good community spirit.

(5)  At one stage Hughes and four other full time staff were ill but Gadd and Haf Morris had saved the situation by their sterling efforts; and Gadd had been transferred to Y Gwyngyll at Hughes' request.

(6)  A general lack of leadership by, and delegation from, Hughes had added greatly to the overall difficulties.

  Dodd added that his reservations and anxieties regarding Hughes had been communicated to Gethin Evans almost daily over a protracted period of time.

  35.34  The outcome of the discussions was that Hughes was sent on 7 March 1985 a list of areas of concern and of the action to be taken to deal with them, with the intention that his progress would be reviewed periodically and in about six months' time. Many of the points made were administrative but emphasis was also laid on improving his relationships with staff. Weekly staff meetings were to be arranged; rules and regulations were to be written and developed; and movement of residents were to be more closely observed. Most relevantly, under the heading "Social Environment", the areas of concern were described as "Lack of purpose for residents" and "Individual and group programmes ill defined or non-existent". Hughes was required to:

"Develop programmes/contracts and objectives for residents, individually and in groups. Evaluate these periodically and define a process which is understood by all staff and residents.

Improve working agreements with area staff."

  We do not know what progress was made in achieving these objectives in the following nine months. Hughes was seeking other job and training opportunities at the time and he succeeded in obtaining a transfer to other child related activity in January 1986[509].

  35.35  The exchanges in early 1985 underline the lack of progress made at Y Gwyngyll in improving the quality of care following the adverse Dyfed team report in or about November 1981. Emergency admissions still predominated. There was no overall strategy for the remaining community homes for children and there were no individual care plans. Placements remained in the control of Nefyn Dodd and Y Gwyngyll appears to have become a form of refuge for disturbed adolescents, where (it was hoped) they would have the minimum opportunity to cause trouble to others. Those of school age attended local schools (including two catering for special needs) but there was no provision for children who were excluded from school, except the possibility of tuition by a visiting teacher for two hours per week; and there was no training for independence and little creative organised activity for residents beyond school age. Even the separate units provided in the original design as accommodation for residents who were being prepared for independent living were never used for that purpose.

Conclusions

  35.36  Y Gwyngyll was planned with the best of intentions but it was probably doomed to failure from the moment when it eventually opened in January 1979. It was badly designed and unsuitably situated and, in the event, it was mis-used because of the lack of an overall county strategy for community homes in Gwynedd. Leadership within the home was defective throughout and the care staff were largely untrained for the work that they had to perform. Moreover, the introduction of Nefyn Dodd in a supervisory role should have been recognised as an error at the latest by the end of 1981. It is a relief to be able to find that the level of any sexual and physical abuse at the home was comparatively low but there were other grave shortcomings. The most serious of these were the lack of individual care planning and the failure to prepare residents for a meaningful future, including their discharge from care, with appropriate liaison with field social workers. In the end, a significant number of residents were left mouldering there and all too many of them went on to more rigorous forms of detention under the penal system.

Footnotes:

501   See para 5.02(2).

502   See further para 36.04.

503   See paras 33.13 and 33.14 for an earlier reference to this man and his history.

504   See para 33.36.

505   See para 34.05

506   See para 37.02.

507   See para 35.09.

508   Then Head of Children's Services.

509   See para 35.16.