Alasdair Webster: Former MP, Daruk Training School superintendent applies for permanent stay of proceedings

A former federal MP who is charged with physically and sexually assaulting children while he worked at a notorious school for juvenile offenders, has made a bid to permanently stop the court proceedings against him.

Alasdair Webster of Springwood has been awarded the OAM for service to the Parliament of Australia and to the community through Indigenous, educational and service organisations.

A former federal Liberal MP facing a string of historic child abuse charges has seen his bid to have a permanent suspension of the upcoming trial refused in court.

Alastair Webster, 90, is facing twenty charges including indecent assault, buggery and assault occasioning actual bodily harm — all springing from his time as an officer at Daruk Training School in Berkshire Park, near Windsor. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

Daruk Training School opened in 1960 and closed in 1984. It was home to hundreds of state wards and juvenile offenders.

Alasdair Webster in 1998.

Webster, who was superintendent of the all-boys school from 1973 to 1984, later went on to become a federal politician. He held the western Sydney seat of Macquarie for the Liberals from 1984 to 1993.

The 90-year-old was charged with these historic offences in February 2020 after evidence about the school was heard at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Daruk Training School. Picture: State Library of NSW

Police previously said they interviewed 80 former pupils who allegedly suffered abuse while at the school.

Other staff at the school have also been charged.

Alasdair Webster.

On Tuesday the court heard the charges against Webster involve six complainants.

Webster is accused of touching some of the alleged victim’s genitalia and forcing them to perform oral sex on him, allegedly saying to one of the complainants “do as you are told and be good”.

Other allegations were too graphic to publish.

The court also heard Webster allegedly watched while children were beaten by guards at Daruk, including one instance where he allegedly looked on as others physically assaulted a child — punching him and kicking him until the child believed his fingers were broken.

Judge Jane Culver told the court these charges were “serious allegations of physical and sexual violence against children in the care of (Webster)”.

The application was heard before Judge Culver at Downing District Court. Picture: Nikki Short.

The defence had raised multiple arguments as to why Webster’s trial should be permanently suspended, the court heard.

One of these reasons was Webster’s litany of serious mental and physical health conditions including brain atrophy, impaired executive functioning and recurrent shingles.

The court heard Webster had a “vanishing life expectancy” and Professor Rosenfeld, a geriatrician, previously told the court it would be “medically inappropriate” for a trial to go ahead.

The court also heard there were concerns about the historic nature of the charges — roughly 40 years had elapsed.

Judge Culver said all these concerns must be considered to have a “cumulative and compounding effect”.

“However, when one balances the concerns raised … against the important public interest of allowing serious criminal allegations to be resolved it could not be said that to have these proceedings continue … would involve unacceptable unfairness,” she added.

The application for a permanent stay was refused. The matter will return to court for a trial before a jury at a later date.