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PERSONAL STATEMENT TO BE MADE BY
SENATOR SIR PHILIP BAILHACHE ON TUESDAY 4TH JULY 2017
In the report of the Independent Jersey Care Inquiry, I have been criticised for a sentence in my Liberation Day speech on 9th May 2008, where I stated: "All child abuse, wherever it happens, is scandalous, but it is the unjustified and remorseless denigration of Jersey and her people that is the real scandal."
The context of the speech was important and will be remembered by all who were in the Island in early 2008. But it was never my intention to compare the evil of child abuse with the scandalous misreporting of the Operation Rectangle investigation.
I accept that, looking at the words in cold print in retrospect, the juxtaposition was unfortunate. I think, however, that very few people listening to that speech as a whole in Liberation Square would have imagined that I was asserting that child abuse was less important than the Island's reputation. I certainly did not intend to give that impression.
I have spent most of my professional life trying to do justice and bringing criminals, including child abusers, to book for their crimes. Anyone who knows me would know that I regard the abuse of children as one of the gravest of crimes. It is not a matter for comparison with the reputation of the Island.
I accept the panel's criticism that those words were ill chosen and I am sorry if they caused distress to anyone who heard them.