Governor general 'took too long to understand child abuse'

Former Governor General Peter Hollingworth, who resigned as the Queen’s representative in Australia a year ago over a paedophilia scandal, said today he took too long to comprehend the damage of child abuse.

Hollingworth, who quit from Australia’s highest public office after an Anglican Church inquiry found he had failed to take strong action against known paedophiles in the church when he was a bishop in the early 1990s, said he had spent the past year coming to terms with the issue of child abuse.

In one of his first public appearances since stepping down, Hollingworth spoke at the launch in Melbourne, the state capital of Victoria, of the book In Moral Danger, by former prostitute Barbara Biggs, herself a victim of abuse.

“Too few of us fully understand or really comprehend the terror, trauma and the awful long-term side effects of child abuse.” Hollingworth said. “I, for one, took too long to fully comprehend these things.”

When he resigned, Hollingworth denied accusations he raped a woman at a church camp in Victoria in the 1960s.

The family of the woman involved later withdrew legal action against him after the alleged victim committed suicide.

Hollingworth has resumed a number of low-key pastoral duties since resigning.

He spends two mornings a week at a Melbourne centre for the homeless serving breakfast and has also been working with an Anglican charity which he headed before 1989 when he became Archbishop of Brisbane, the state capital of Queensland.

Australia gained independence from Britain in 1901, but still retains the Queen of England as head of state, with a governor general as its representative.