Abuse complainants get $5m from order

The St John of God order has paid about $5.1 million to boys complaining of sexual abuse at Christchurch's Marylands home in the 1970s.

The order's Australasian Provincial, Brother Peter Burke, travelled from Australia to give evidence at the trial of former Marylands brother Bernard Kevin McGrath, 58, who has pleaded not guilty to 46 sexual abuse charges and is on trial in the Christchurch High Court.

Brother Burke said more could be paid. Details of a "pastoral gesture" - a settlement - to one of the complainants at the trial were still to be finalised, and negotiations with other men were stopped during the trial.

Brother Burke said his role in making the pastoral gestures had been to listen rather than to challenge what he was being told by men who were at Marylands as boys in the 1970s. He said the church had proceeded "openly and transparently".

Defence counsel Raoul Neave asked him: "You believed what you were being told, and made no secret of the fact?"

He replied: "I came from a very Christian point of view, and also the view that to sit and listen to stories that I never in my wildest dreams thought I would hear, it was very hard to have to say it was made up."

Brother Burke said about $5.1 million had been paid out so far, though not all to boys alleging abuse by McGrath.

Mr Neave pointed out there had been allegations against a significant number of brothers working at Marylands over the years.

Brother Burke said he was first told of the allegations in a phone call from a reporter from a Christchurch newspaper in 2002.

He set up a system for people to register as complainants, and then spoke to them, and arranged help as needed.

This could mean providing medical, dental, or educational help, or paying for eye-glasses, or it could mean a payment.

Payments were mainly made through lawyers and accountants representing the complainants and he hoped that trusts were set up to provide for them, rather than simply passing the money straight on.

He took the view that it was the police's job to investigate the case, and his role to listen to what was said.

Brother Burke acknowledged there had been publicity about earlier cases, in which $300,000 had been paid to complainants in New Zealand, and $3.5 million in Australia.

He acknowledged there had been one Christchurch case of a man being paid out and later prosecuted for a false complaint.

- NZPA