The investigation examined the scale and nature of the sexual abuse experienced by children in the care of Lambeth Council over several decades since the 1960s, and the extent of any institutional failures to protect children in care from sexual abuse and exploitation. It looked in detail at five of Lambeth Council’s residential children’s units – Angell Road, South Vale Assessment Centre, the Shirley Oaks complex, Ivy House and Monkton Street. The latter two cared for children with complex needs and communication difficulties. The Inquiry also examined the Council’s foster care service.

The report concludes as follows: It is hard to comprehend the cruelty and sexual abuse inflicted on children in the care of Lambeth Council over many years, by staff, by foster carers and their families, and by volunteers in residential settings. With one or two exceptions, a succession of elected members and senior professionals ought to have been held accountable for allowing this to happen, either by their active commission or complicit omission. Lambeth Council was only able to identify one senior Council employee, over the course of 40 years, who was disciplined for their part in this catalogue of sexual abuse.

By June 2020, Lambeth Council was aware of 705 former residents of three children’s homes in this investigation (Shirley Oaks, South Vale and Angell Road) who have made complaints of sexual abuse. The biggest of these homes – Shirley Oaks – was the subject of allegations against 177 members of staff or individuals connected with the home, involving at least 529 former residents. It was closed in 1983. The true scale of the sexual abuse against children in Lambeth Council’s care will never be known, but it is certain to be significantly higher than is formally recorded.

Frontline staff employed to care for these most vulnerable children frequently failed to take action when they knew about sexual abuse. In so many cases they showed little warmth or compassion towards the child victims, who were left to cope with the trauma of their abuse on their own. More widely, it was as if staff intended to create a harsh and punitive environment for children who had the misfortune to be in public care, through no fault of their own.

Far from being a sanctuary from abuse and neglect, Shirley Oaks and South Vale were brutal places where violence and sexual assault were allowed to flourish. Angell Road systematically exposed children (including those under the age of five years) to sexual abuse. For many children, these homes did nothing to change their lives for the better. For many children, the experience they had was worse than living at home with their birth families.

Professor Alexis Jay commented – “This was a vicious and regressive culture for which a succession of leading elected members were mainly responsible, aided and abetted in some instance by self-serving senior officials,”

It notes that the overwhelming majority of children in its homes were black. At Shirley Oaks, in 1980 57% of the children its care were black; at South Vale home children a decade later 85% of the children were black. “Racism was evident in the hostile and abusive treatment towards them by some staff.”

Professor Jay further added: “This all contributed to allowing children in their care to suffer the most horrendous sexual abuse, with just one senior council employee disciplined for their part in it. We hope this report and our recommendations will ensure abuse on this scale never happens again.”

The report said Lambeth Council was dominated by “politicised behaviour and turmoil” during the 1980s, when Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister, and that the council sought to “take on the Government” to the detriment of local services. The report further adds: “During that time, children in care became pawns in a toxic power game within Lambeth Council and between the council and central government….This turmoil and failure to act to improve children’s social care continued into the 1990s and beyond.”

It said “bullying, intimidation, racism and sexism thrived within Lambeth Council”, all of which was set within a context of corruption and financial mismanagement which permeated much of Lambeth Council’s operations.

The report acknowledged there were “much‑improved systems in Lambeth”, but said there was still evidence of a more recent case, from 2016, in which an allegation of rape did not result in a strategy meeting taking place to consider the claim.

The report added: “For several decades, senior staff and councillors at Lambeth Council failed to effect change, despite overwhelming evidence that children in its care did not have the quality of life and protection to which they were entitled, and were being put at serious risk of sexual abuse.”

Lambeth council has only very recently accepted that children in its care were sexually abused and it had failed them. It told the inquiry that successive council administrations had created and overseen conditions where “appalling and absolutely shocking and horrendous abuse was perpetrated.”

The report recommends amongst three others that the Metropolitan police investigate the case of one child, known as LA-A2, who was found dead in a bathroom in one of the homes, Shirley Oaks, in 1977. The report found the council had not informed the coroner that he had alleged he was sexually abused by Donald Hosegood, his “house father”. It was further revealed in the report that Hosegood was a confirmed Freemason.

Charles Derham of Remedy Law comments: “it is a welcome recommendation that the Inquiry have sought for Lambeth to be further investigated in relation to their omission to provide key information to the Coroner. What is deeply saddening is just how many others may have lost their lives due to the abuse they suffered whilst in the care of Lambeth?”

The inquiry report criticised police for failing to properly investigate sexual abuse during Operation Bell in 1992 and Operation Middleton which ended in 2003.

Charles Derham further comments: “should it have been further recommended that there ought to be an independent investigation related to the failings in both Operation Bell and Operation Middleton that the report has heavily criticised”.

The overwhelming theme throughout the report is that there was “a callous disregard for the vulnerable children employees {they} were paid to look after.” and “as a consequence, individuals who posed a risk to children were able to infiltrate children’s homes and foster care, with devastating, life-long consequences for their victims.” The report found “clear evidence” that sexual offenders and those suspected of sexual abuse were co-workers in Lambeth Council’s children’s homes at the same time.

Charles Derham concludes: “no child in care should ever feel “worthless” and exposed to “levels of cruelty and sexual abuse that are hard to comprehend” at any level and this MUST change.”

To read the full Report click HERE