Pell says the Commission's views "are not supported by the evidence".

The Commission's findings were made public in 2017. However, a court redacted the report because Pell was facing child abuse charges at the time.

The unredacted chapters of the findings were not made public until late Thursday. They find Pell knowingly being involved in the movement of a relentless abuser, of failing to recommend the removal of another and not doing sufficient to deal with a third criminal clergyman.

In particular, the Commission has dismissed Pell's long-stated defence that he did not know about the actions of the recidivist abuser, Gerald Risdale in Ballarat.

Ridsdale committed more than 130 offences against children as young as four between the 1960s and 1980s.

Now in prison, as recently as April he was charged with additional historical sexual abuse offences.

Pell's involvement was as a relatively junior priest: he was one of the "consultors" of then Ballarat Bishop, Ronald Mulkearns. "Consultors" are a small group of priests the bishop consults regarding diocesan appointments and movement of priests around the bishop's diocese.

Pell maintains Mulkearns did not give the true reason for moving Risdale and that Mulkearns lied in not giving the true reason to the consultors.

The Royal Commission differs and does not accept that Mulkearns lied to his consultors.

"Cardinal Pell's evidence that ‘paedophilia was not mentioned' and that the ‘true' reason was not given is not accepted. It is 'implausible' given the matters set out above that Bishop Mulkearns did not inform those at the meeting of at least complaints of sexual abuse of children having been made."

The Commission accepted that Mulkearns made the final decision to shift Ridsdale to another parish to avoid scandal and called Mulkearns recurring practice an "extraordinary and inexcusable failure" and "appalling conduct".

However, the Commission went on to find that Pell and the other consultors failed to advise against the Mulkerns proposal.

The Commission labelled Pell and the other consultors failure to act as "unacceptable".

Cardinal Pell in his testimony to the Royal Commission was critical of Mulkearns and another priest responsible for earlier appointing Ridsdale to the small parish of Inglewood when they knew of allegations of child sexual abuse against him.

The finding means that Cardinal Pell was aware of allegations of sexual abuse against Ridsdale at least a decade before Ridsdale's offending was investigated by police and possibly earlier. The Commission noted it would be "surprised" if Mulkearns deceived Cardinal Pell at a 1977 College of Consultors meeting when Ridsdale's appointment to the Edenhope parish was discussed.

In other instances of alleged neglect of victims in the Ballarat diocese, the Commission accepted Pell's testimony.

The most serious allegation is that Pell offered to bribe David Risdale to take allegations of sexual abuse again his uncle, Gerald Risdale, to a church hearing rather than the Police.

"I never impeded or discouraged anyone from going to the Police," he told the Royal Commission.

The Royal Commission found that in two other instances, Cardinal Pell was falsely accused by otherwise honest witnesses in apparent cases of mistaken identity.

Sources

• SMH
• The Australian

The Commission's report says a culture of secrecy and failures in the church's structure led to children being abused across the diocese over a number of decades.

"That failure led to the suffering and often irreparable harm to children, their families and the wider community."

The Commission found that the Church did not act in the children's interests, which meant the abuse situation the children were in continued.

The abuse could have been avoided if the Church had acted in the interests of children.

Three public hearings into the Ballarat situation looked at the effect of child sexual abuse on an entire town.

They revealed the extent of child sex abuse across parishes, schools and homes.

Ninety per cent of the 140 abuse complaints reported to the diocese related to seven priests.

Over half the complaints concerned Gerald Ridsdale.

He held 16 appointments over his 29-year career as a priest.

His crimes were detailed in over 100 pages of the report.

They were spread across western Victoria where he was given 16 appointments over a period of 29 years.

The report says the bishop at the time, Ronald Mulkearns, knew of Ridsdale's abuse as early as 1975.

Hundreds of children were molested while Mulkearns was bishop.

He moved priests between parishes as rumours of their offending grew.

The commissioners found the response of the Diocese to complaints and concerns about different priests "was remarkably and disturbingly similar".

The Christian Brothers also come under fire in the report.

The religious order operated six schools in Ballarat and Warrnambool.

Four of the St Alipius boys school's Brothers and Ridsdale, who was their chaplain, were accused of sexually assaulting children.

All but one, who died before charges could be laid, have been convicted.

The Commissioners found the Brothers' response to complaints was "grossly inadequate".

They say they "completely failed … to protect the most vulnerable children in their care", operating within a structure "without checks and balances".

"On some occasions, the response to allegations or reports of Christian Brothers conducting themselves in a sexually inappropriate manner with children was dismissive," the Commissioners say.

One of the victims said it was a travesty that no individual had been charged with criminal negligence for the abuse committed in Ballarat.

"You know, it's basically a crime against humanity ...They're actually the criminals, not us, and this report shows that they did know, and they did cover up the crimes and hopefully they're liable and put in jail like they should be."

He said some of his classmates committed suicide to end their suffering.

Justin Driscoll, the Vicar General of the Ballarat Diocese, says the church accepted the findings.

Source

• ABC News
• Herald Sun
• Image: The Courier

Mulkearns, who died in April, was blamed for allowing paedophile priests to continue to operate in Victoria.

The late bishop left a reported $2.1m to be used by the current bishop of Ballarat for the benefit of the diocese "at his absolute discretion", according to the Herald Sun.

Ballarat's bishop, Paul Bird, said in a statement on Tuesday that the bequest would be used to help victims.

"Whatever the diocese of Ballarat receives from Bishop Mulkearns' estate, I intend to set aside for assistance to victims of abuse," Bird said. "This will continue the support that the diocese has given to abuse victims over many years." Read more

They accuse Bishop Ronal Mulkearns and the Diocese of Ballarat of negligence for allegedly failing to protect them and other victims, despite being aware of complaints against Fr Gerard Ridsdale.

Ridsdale was convicted in 2014 of 34 charges against children between 1961 and 1980.

He had also been convicted in 1993, 1994 and 2006 for a string of other child sex offences.

Ridsdale was parish priest at Inglewood in 1975 when local police informed Bishop Mulkearns that Ridsdale had abused children.

Bishop Mulkearns sent Ridsdale away for counselling and then on to the next parish.

In the intervening years, Ridsdale made dozens of other children his victims.

The lawyer representing the victims, Viv Waller said: "I think it's quite possible that Gerald Ridsdale is Victoria's worst career paedophile."

Bishop Mulkearns was excused from appearing at the Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry into Church Abuse in 2013 after a neuropsychological examination.

The current Bishop of Ballarat, Paul Bird, did attend and admitted the decision to keep Ridsdale in the priesthood in 1975 was wrong.

Ms Walker said the case was unprecedented because it bypassed the Catholic Church's so-called "Ellis defence" - where the Church cannot be sued because, technically, it does not exist as a legal entity.

Meanwhile, Fairfax Media revealed that despite a Church promise to abandon the "Ellis defence", some dioceses and religious orders are not prepared to publicly commit to that.

Fairfax Media requested a formal undertaking from nine dioceses and religious orders that they would no longer employ the "Ellis defence" in current and future sex abuse lawsuits.

None of the organisations were willing to issue a formal statement confirming that position.

It is understood that a dispute between church organisations and their insurers has become a major impediment to implementing a policy to abandon the "Ellis defence".

Australia's Royal Commission into Institutional Child Sexual Abuse is starting a three-week hearing into decades of horrific abuse in Ballarat diocese.

Sources

• ABC
• Sydney Morning Herald
• The Courier
• Image: The Courier