Don’t spare child abuser just for being a woman… damage caused can have repercussions long in to adulthood
PRINCESS Diana’s brother Charles has announced he is to divorce for the third time.
Earl Spencer hasn’t given the reasons (there’s rarely just one) behind the split from Canadian philanthropist Karen Gordon, but it’s fair to assume that writing a memoir about the physical and sexual abuse he suffered at boarding school might have played its part.
Particularly as it led to him undergoing residential treatment for psychological trauma towards the end of last year.
In his book, A Very Private School, he reveals he was regularly beaten by male teachers at Maidwell Hall prep school in Northamptonshire and sexually abused by a predatory assistant matron who he didn’t identify.
He was 11, she was around 20 and, he claims, she routinely groomed and abused him and other boys after lights out.
Now another man who attended the school has come forward to corroborate Charles’s recollections and says he too was abused by her.
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“She used to sleep with some boys and then she did, I guess, sexual favours to others,” he says.
He reveals he has previously made light of what happened, but since reading the memoir he now realises that what she did was “clearly wrong”.
I’ll say.
Yet there is still a tendency for people to view the older woman/young boy sexual experience from a “lucky him” perspective.
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Indeed, when I raised the subject at a dinner with friends the other night, that was the exact response.
“And how would you feel about it if it was a male teacher routinely abusing 11-year-old girls in their beds at night?” I asked.
“Disgusting,” was the general response.
Even Charles himself didn’t feel it was abuse at the time.
He says he craved her sexual attention because it made him feel special.
But it was a power imbalance and emotionally destabilised him, leading to self-harming episodes “at the prospect of losing her” and wanting “full sex from a too early age”.
The other man, a businessman from the Midlands, has named her as a now 67-year-old grandmother called Sally Jane Carr, who retrained and became an experienced mental health practitioner.
So what happens now?
Northamptonshire police have launched an investigation into the school and urged “anyone who has suffered abuse” to come forward.
Devastating breach of trust
So will it result in prosecution?
It remains to be seen, particularly as Ms Carr’s lawyer says there are “very clear factual discrepancies” which “unequivocally confirm that our client is not the perpetrator of the alleged abuse against Earl Spencer”.
But whatever the outcome in this case, any sexual abuse of a minor by someone in a position of authority and who is supposed to be protecting them is a potentially devastating breach of trust that can have psychological repercussions long into adulthood.
And if it’s a woman committing that crime, there’s no reason to view it any less harshly.
Bonkers Toyah will put the pogo in Strictly
IF you haven’t yet seen Toyah And Robert’s Sunday Lunch on YouTube, I recommend it.
Just make sure you’re sitting down.
For while the title might suggest 66-year-old former punk Toyah Willcox is imparting her trick for crunchy roasties, she’s actually belting out rock songs in a barely-there outfit while husband Robert Fripp plays guitar.
It’s bonkers and brilliant.
Now we learn that Toyah has signed up for this year’s Strictly.
Fasten your seat belts, Britain: It’s going to be a gloriously zany ride.
Such a 'Lotte to say
ANTONIA BANCE has been selected to stand for Labour in the newly-formed West Midlands constituency of Tipton and Wednesbury.
Trouble is, it appears she forgot to tell her other half.
In response, Charlotte Dawkins raged on X: “Two days after you lose your mum suddenly, your so-called partner of the last 12 years and co-parent to your beautiful 5 year old who you spent 4 hard years of IVF to have, then decides to tell you that they’re standing for Parliament without any discussion with you.
“Just when you think you know someone and you know what’s important in this life – you’re told you and your beloved daughter [don’t] matter as much as her need to be the Labour MP!
“So, yes please do consider voting for Antonia Bance if you’re in Tipton and Wednesbury – she’s just the kind of person to care for you in your hour of need! A shining of example of the very best that the Labour Party have to offer us!”
Ouch. Charlotte is clearly grief-stricken and rashly lashed out before later deleting the post.
But one can’t imagine there’s much light-hearted “bants” in the Bance household right now.
Livin' La Vida Lovely
CAVALRY horse Vida was last seen covered in blood, bolting through the streets of London after getting spooked during a routine training exercise.
So it’s lovely to seer her and fellow bolter Trojan gently nuzzling each other in the idyllic surrounds of a field, where they are both recovering under the care of The Horse Trust.
“We look forward to seeing them back on duty in due course,” says a spokesman for the Household Cavalry.
One suspects these majestic animals might like to stay exactly where they are.
'Turning in his grave'
IN the early ’80s I worked as a barmaid at The Ship in Wandsworth, South West London.
Once a local pub, it had recently been discovered by braying “Yuppies” (Young Urban Professionals) who took over the roomy, river-facing front bar while the long-term regulars huddled in the spit and sawdust confines of the cosy back bar next to the cement works.
The actor Oliver Reed came in a couple of times and would sit glowering with the old-timers, muttering about how loud and gauche the other lot were.
This week, I read that new Reform leader Nigel Farage reportedly plotted his shock comeback while enjoying a pint there.
Oliver will be turning in his grave
Traitors by nature
FILMING is about to start on the next season of the American version of The Traitors – filmed at the same Scottish castle as the UK one.
One of the participants is King Charles’s second cousin Lord Ivar Mountbatten.
Surely Harry and Meghan might have been more appropriate?
Bye bye baby...
TENNIS star Emma Raducanu has reportedly split from boyfriend Carlo Agostinelli.
How do we know? Because they have “unfollowed each other on Instagram”.
For those of us who dated in the “olden times”, as the Gen Zs might call it, what was our version of this?
Sending back their Bay City Rollers vinyl is about all I could come up with.
Office lingo a bore
“BLUE sky thinking,” “touch base” and “low-hanging fruit” have been voted by workers as the top three most-hated office phrases.
As a freelancer, I haven’t worked in an office for decades, but I travel on enough Tubes and trains to overhear meaningless corporate jargon churned out by loud, self-important types.
So I have my own list.
“Deep dive”, “move the needle”, “bandwidth”, “let’s table this” and my absolute favourite . . . by which I mean most hated . . . “core competencies”.
Oh do bore off.
As an antidote, I have discovered an online corporate bulls**t generator (atrixnet.com/bs-generator) which uses an adverb, verb, adjective and noun to randomly produce phrases such as “synergistically mesh superior information” and “authoritatively grow low-risk high yield quality vectors”.
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It’s a tonic.
Or, in corporate speak, an absolute game changer that will empower you to think outside the box.