The broadcaster Nicky Campbell has described a culture of anticipated violence, normalised sexual assault and relentless physical abuse at Edinburgh Academy during two hours of searing and emotional testimony to the Scottish child abuse inquiry.
Coming close to tears on a number of occasions, Campbell, now 62, who was a day pupil at the prestigious private school from the ages of five to 17, told the inquiry of the “horrendous knock-on effect” on his life of the abuses he experienced and witnessed happening to other children.
And to applause from other survivors in the public gallery, the BBC Radio 5 Live presenter vented his fury that one of his alleged abusers, Iain Wares, remained at liberty in South Africa, where the 83-year-old is fighting extradition to face charges relating to his time teaching at the academy and also at Fettes College during the 60s and 70s.
“He’s one of the worst paedophiles and most prolific in British criminal history,” he said. “It is a scandal, it is disgusting.”
Campbell claimed that “egregious cock-ups” by the Crown Office had delayed proceedings, with concerns raised about the age of the accused.
One of a number of former pupils who are giving evidence to the long-running inquiry, Campbell also spoke of a culture of complicity, saying other teachers ignored signs of abuse and labelled boys who tried to speak up as “trouble makers”.
He told the lead counsel for the inquiry, Andrew Brown QC, that he was “haunted” by the memory of Wares – nicknamed “Weirdo” by pupils – leaning over a boy and sexually assaulting him as the boy tried to get away in a junior school changing room when both children were eight or nine.
Campbell described how another teacher would “torture” boys during his classes with the prospect of being called on for a beating on the bottom with a wooden bat “for no reason or on the slightest of pretexts” and with a force that was “like teeing off at the Open”.
He did not tell his parents about this violence, and explained that his fellow pupils were “groomed into thinking this is what teachers do”.
In his first year at the senior school, when the boys were still wearing a uniform of shorts, another teacher, Hamish Dawson, would regularly select a pupil to lie across his knees and be tickled in front of the class for some minor infraction like cheekiness.
“On the fourth occasion his fingers went into my underwear and he started playing with my penis,” Campbell told the inquiry. “I remember being confused and not telling anyone, because again it could have been my fault.”
On what he said was “one of the worst days of my school life”, Campbell recalled being brutally physically assaulted when he was 14 or 15 by another teacher, who kicked and punched him “like a rag doll”, again for no specific reason.
On this occasion Campbell did tell his mother about the attack. She called the school to complain, later receiving a “mealy mouthed” apology from the teacher in question.
The broadcaster later described the “life changing” phone call he had in 2022 with the journalist Alex Renton, after his wife heard Renton’s Radio 4 documentary series In Dark Corners about abuse in Britain elite public schools, which included testimony from former Edinburgh Academy pupils.
“It’s difficult to talk about,” said Campbell. “There’s a lot of shame in it, then I realised this [abuse] was happening on an industrial scale.”
Campbell later interviewed Renton for his own podcast, Different, opening the floodgates of testimony from former pupils who are still contacting him with their own stories of abuse.
He said that, despite the heavy toll the past 14 months had taken on him personally, disrupting his sleep and causing him to seek therapy, “being part of this is the best decision I ever made”.
Edinburgh Academy has apologised “unreservedly” to former pupils, and Campbell praised the current head, Barry Welsh, for his efforts to engage with survivors.
But Campbell called on the academy to apologise for moving Wares on “like a troublesome priest” to Fettes College, and pleaded with Lady Smith to consider the importance of a legal duty of mandatory reporting in her final recommendations: “This is not about witch-hunts, it’s about child protection.”
A spokesperson for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service said: “This has been a complex investigation and COPFS appreciates that it has been difficult for all those involved.
“In order to protect any future proceedings and to preserve the rights of the complainers, the Crown will not comment further at this stage.”
• This article was amended on 23 August 2023. An earlier version referred to Fettes Academy rather than Fettes College.
