Les wants to challenge people who are judgemental about abuse victims, but finds it hard to speak out
All names and identifying details have been changed.
Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Because his home life was difficult and deprived, there were many things about being in a children’s home that Les liked.
But this meant he did not tell anyone he was being sexually abused by an older boy, although he thinks the staff knew.
Les lived with his parents and two brothers until he was eight years old and his father ‘kicked my mum out’ and moved his girlfriend in ‘with about 10 kids’.
Life was difficult with so many people living in a small house and Les and his brothers were not happy with the new arrangements. They refused to call their dad’s girlfriend ‘mum’, and on Les’s ninth birthday, he and his brothers were sent to a children’s home.
Here, Les explains, ‘the older boys picked on you’ and he says he became a ‘toy boy’ for one of them, who sexually abused him. This happened two or three times a week.
He describes the conflict he felt about his situation. He liked being fed three times a day and having ‘a nice clean bed’. He also enjoyed going to the local scouts and being given money to go to the cinema at weekends.
Les didn’t say anything about the abuse to anyone, but he got the impression from comments they made that the staff knew what was going on.
The older boy who was abusing Les eventually left the home but stayed living nearby. The boys were allowed visitors at weekends.
The abuser came to see Les nearly every weekend. He would take Les outside, and drag him into the grounds and sexually abuse him. No one questioned why the older boy visited so often, and what he was doing.
The abuse stopped when Les was 12 and he and his brothers went to live with their mother. Les never saw the abuser again and he says, ‘I put it to the back of my brain, not wanting to tell anyone or even think about it'.
Years later, Les describes how ‘when Jimmy Savile hit the news, it was hard because it was in your face 24/7’. At work he heard people making comments like ‘Everyone’s jumping on the bandwagon now that he’s dead … they’re just after his money … why didn’t they say something at the time?’
Les says he wanted to tell them ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about’, but ‘it takes a lot of courage to speak after 20 years’.
He doesn’t know why he didn’t say anything about the abuse at the time, not even to his brothers. He thinks it was partly because he was ashamed, and also he thought it was happening to others so it was ‘just a normal thing’.
Les thinks that children today are more aware of what sexual abuse is. But he says it is important they feel able to tell someone if anyone is doing anything to them they don’t like.
He and his wife have children, grandchildren and great grandchildren. He adds that for many years he has enjoyed his career.