There was sex abuse at my school, says Robert Peston: BBC economics editor uses article to admit he is still haunted by what he witnessed

School days: Mr Peston, pictured as a schoolboy, had always seen the school as a haven and refuge 

Robert Peston revealed last night he is haunted by the  sexual abuse that went on at his former school.

The BBC’s economics editor believes the ‘hideous predilection’ of at least one teacher was regarded as an ‘eccentricity to be tolerated’ in the liberal 1970s.

‘Goodness knows how many other paedophiles were for years able to get away with it in schools like mine,’ he wrote in a newspaper article.

Mr Peston admitted that his ‘fond memories’ of his state school had been replaced by anxieties as a parent about ‘the vulnerability of our children even in institutions that seem caring and healthy’.

Having previously seen his school as a ‘haven and refuge from the badness in the world’, Mr Peston was forced to reappraise his feelings after a former pupil wrote to him to reveal he had been sexually abused there.  (more...)

There was sex abuse at my school, says Robert Peston: BBC economics editor uses article to admit he is still haunted by what he witnessed

Peston in his own words:

How did the paedophile teachers at my school get away with it for so long? Were liberal Seventies values partly to blame, asks one of the BBC's most respected voices in this deeply personal and troubling account