The CEO of a hospital in Tasmania has acknowledged catastrophic failures in relation to a pedophile nurse who worked on a children's ward for nearly two decades.
Senior Launceston General Hospital (LGH) figures have told an inquiry that staff had no training about how to identify grooming, and that current nurses may not be fully aware of mandatory reporting requirements.
A commission of inquiry examining Tasmanian government responses to child sexual abuse allegations in the public service is this week focusing on James Geoffrey Griffin.
Griffin took his own life in October 2019, shortly after being charged with multiple child sexual abuse offences.
Several survivors have told the inquiry they were abused by Griffin, including Tiffany Skeggs, who met him at her netball club, where he was a volunteer.
Griffin sexually abused and emotionally controlled Ms Skeggs from the age of 12 and through her teenage years.
The inquiry has been told Griffin breached professional boundaries at the LGH multiple times and was warned, but the matters weren't escalated.
In 2011 a colleague of Griffin's disclosed to LGH human resources that she had been sexually abused by him as a child, but the "matter went nowhere".
Eric Daniels, chief executive of the hospital, agreed there had been a catastrophic failure of LGH structures and management.
"With the information I've received this week, it's not robust," Mr Daniels said on Thursday.
"It doesn't provide for an appropriate amount of accountability. It doesn't provide for ... ensuring the safety of children in our care is appropriate."
He said he didn't order an investigation into Griffin after his death, and was told by subordinates that workplace conduct allegations made against Griffin had been investigated and not substantiated.
Mr Daniels agreed the only reason he knew more about Griffin's conduct was because the inquiry had investigated.
"Why did you not ask for there to be a robust investigation when you found out there had been a pedophile on a children's ward?," counsel assisting the inquiry, Elizabeth Bennett, SC, asked.
"I can't answer that I'm sorry," Mr Daniels replied.
Nursing and midwifery director Janette Tonks said that before 2019 no one at the hospital had been trained to identify grooming.
The hospital's executive director of nursing, Helen Bryan, said she could not guarantee every nurse currently employed was fully aware of a mandatory requirement under law to report child sexual abuse suspicions.
Ms Skeggs, who came forward to police in 2019, said she was later told by a detective Griffin had been on their radar for some time.
Griffin died by suicide while on bail.
"I cannot for the life of me fathom how anyone, whether it was the initial police bail or the subsequent court bail, could deem he was safe to return to the community," Ms Skeggs said.
"I had made police aware ... of him stating 'I will f***ing kill myself before I go to prison', and they still released him."
The inquiry was called in November 2020, largely in response to allegations against Griffin receiving media coverage.
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