Sky News can reveal that the government has rowed back on a national compensation scheme for victims of child sexual abuse, despite it being promised under the previous Conservative administration.
Warning – this story contains references to sexual and physical abuse
A National Redress Scheme was one of 20 key recommendations made by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), but a Home Office report reveals the government has scrapped it because of the cost.
Marie, who is 71, suffered alleged sexual, physical, and emotional abuse at Greenfield House Convent in St Helens, Merseyside, between 1959 and 1962, and is still fighting for compensation.
Greenfield House Convent, where Marie says she was abused
As soon as she arrived as a six-year-old, Marie says her hair was cut off, her name changed, and she experienced regular beatings from the nuns and students.
She claims a nun instigated the violence, including when Marie was held down so that her legs were “spread-eagled” as she was sexually abused with a coat hanger.
Merseyside Police investigated claims of abuse at the convent, but in 2016, a suspect died before charges could be brought.
Marie has received an apology from the Catholic body that ran the home; she tried to sue them, but her claim was rejected because it was filed too long after the alleged abuse.
Marie, 71, is still fighting for compensation for the abuse she says she suffered as a child
In February, ministers said the law would change for victims of sexual abuse trying to sue institutions for damages, which was a recommendation from the IICSA.
Previously, people had to make a civil claim before they were 21, unless the victim could prove a fair trial could proceed despite the time lapse.
Campaigners argued for the time limit to be removed as, on average, victims wait 26 years to come forward. Changes to the 1980 Limitation Act could lead to more people making claims.
Peter Garsden, President of The Association of Child Abuse Lawyers
Civil cases ‘can take three to five years’
But Peter Garsden, president of the Association of Child Abuse Lawyers, worries that when it comes to historical abuse where the defendant is dead, institutions will still argue that it is impossible to have a fair trial and will fight to have the case thrown out of court.
Mr Garsden said it takes “between three and five years” for a civil case to get to trial.
He warned that claimants “can end up losing if you go through that process. Whereas the Redress Scheme would be quicker, much more straightforward, and much more likely to give justice to the victims”.
Victim awarded £10 compensation
Jimbo, who was a victim of abuse at St Aidan’s children’s home in Cheshire, took his case to the High Court twice and the Court of Appeal three times, but, after 13 years, all he ended up with was £10 for his bus fare to court.
Despite the Lord Justice of Appeal saying he believed that the abuse had occurred, Jimbo lost his claim because of the time limit for child sexual abuse claims to be made.
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Neither Marie nor Jimbo is likely to benefit from the removal of the time limit for personal injury claims, which is why Mr Garsden is calling on the government to implement a National Redress Scheme for victims of sexual abuse, as recommended by the IICSA.
Hundreds of millions paid to victims
The governments in Scotland and Northern Ireland have set up compensation schemes and paid hundreds of millions of pounds to victims.
In 2023, the then Conservative government said a similar scheme would be organised for England and Wales.
But the Home Office admitted in its Tackling Child Sexual Abuse: Progress Update that it “is not currently taking forward any further steps on the IICSA proposal for a separate, national financial redress scheme for all survivors of child sexual abuse”.
“In the current fiscal environment, this recommendation is very difficult to take forward,” it added.
For victims, the scheme was the last chance of compensation for a lifetime blighted by abuse.
“The money is about justice and about all the other people who have had to suffer this abuse,” Marie said.
OKX founder and CEO Star Xu has publicly defended the crypto exchange after Tron founder Justin Sun accused it of failing to act on a law enforcement request to freeze stolen funds following a recent hack of Tron’s official X account.
“OKX also has consumers protection policy according to law, we can’t freeze a customer’s funds according to your personal X post or an oral communication. I think you should understand it as the CEO of HTX,” Xu said in an X post.
OKX says there is no communication in the spam box, either
Xu said that the crypto exchange had not received any related correspondence through OKX’s official channels. “Our LE cooperation team just checked the email, including the spam box; we haven’t received any request related with this case,” Xu said.
In what is now an unavailable X post, but was screenshotted by Xu, Sun had earlier claimed that OKX has not responded to a “freeze notice” sent to its official email address from a “relevant law enforcement agency.” Sun said that he had no other way to contact OKX’s compliance department.
“These stolen funds do not belong to me; I’m acting to protect the community,” Sun said. On May 3, Tron DAO told its 1.7 million X followers that its account had been compromised. Tron explained that during the breach, an unauthorized party posted a malicious contract address, sent direct messages, and followed unfamiliar accounts.
“If you received a DM from our account on May 2, please delete it and consider it the work of the attacker.”
In response to Sun’s claims of inaction, Xu publicly called on him to provide a screenshot showing when and where the law enforcement request was made.
The Tron incident is one of several recent security breaches involving high-profile crypto accounts on X.
Related: Over 14,500 Tron addresses at risk of silent hijacking
Kaito AI, an artificial intelligence-powered platform that aggregates crypto data to provide market analysis for users, and its founder, Yu Hu, were the victims of an X social media hack on March 15. The hackers opened up a short position on KAITO tokens before posting that the Kaito wallets were compromised and advised users that their funds were not safe.
The Pump.fun X account was compromised on Feb. 26 to promote a fake governance token called “PUMP” and other fraudulent coins.
Meanwhile, the X account of UK member of Parliament and Leader of the House of Commons, Lucy Powell, was hacked to promote a scam crypto token.
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