Lady Smith, Chair of the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry (SCAI), has today, Wednesday 20 August, published her findings relating to the provision of residential care for children at Keil School in Dumbarton.
Protection of school’s reputation allowed teacher to abuse hundreds of times
She concludes a ‘disgraceful abdication of responsibility’ resulted in widespread abuse, as school authorities prioritised its reputation over the interests of the children.
The findings are part of SCAI’s overall Boarding Schools case study and echo abuse found to have taken place at other establishments including, Loretto School, Morrison’s Academy, Gordonstoun, Queen Victoria School and Merchiston Castle School and the boarding schools run by two male religious orders, namely the Benedictines and the Marist Brothers.
Keil School was originally established by the Mackinnon-MacNeill Trust with the philanthropic intention of educating a small number of boys from the rural west of Scotland.
It moved to Dumbarton in the 1920s and became a tough school where boys were expected to develop the ability to endure violence and suffer in silence.
By the late 1950s abusive practices were normalised and remained so until the 1980s.
Lady Smith said: “Protection of the reputation of the school was prioritised over the interests of children; that was a disgraceful abdication of responsibility.
“The prevailing culture allowed two paedophiles to operate without fear of discovery.
“One of those, William Bain was a physics teacher and house tutor who, whilst employed at Keil between 1987 and 2000, groomed and sexually abused many children. He sexually abused some children on hundreds of occasions and did so on an almost daily basis.”
Publication of these findings had been due to take place earlier in 2025 but were held back at the request of the Crown to await the outcome of further trial proceedings against Bain.
Those proceedings had been raised after the conclusion of SCAI’s evidential hearings and involved multiple charges of him sexually abusing children at a number of schools in Scotland, including Keil.
They have now concluded with Bain having been convicted on 30 June 2025 at the High Court in Glasgow and sentenced to 9 years imprisonment.
That was the second occasion on which he was tried and convicted, on multiple charges, of having sexually abused children at Keil School; the first having been in May 2016 when, following conviction, he was sentenced to six and half years imprisonment.
Lady Smith said: “The abuse Bain perpetrated persisted for years despite concerns about his behaviour arising early on after a parent complained.
“Inadequate investigation followed, and the problem was then covered up by headmaster Christopher Tongue and other senior staff.
“Despite parents being assured that reports of his behaviour would go on his record, this did not happen, and Tongue’s successor as headmaster was never told about it.”
Another predatory paedophile, David Gutteridge, an English teacher and house tutor at Keil from 1989 to 1991, abused one particularly vulnerable pupil away from the school having carefully engineered the circumstances.
In September 2024 he was convicted at Forfar Sheriff Court of having indecently assaulted that pupil and sentenced to seventeen months imprisonment.
In 2015 he was sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment at Harrow Crown Court for two charges of indecent assault of a teenage boy in the 1980s. The offences were committed in England prior to his arrival at Keil.
Lady Smith said: “The cases of Bain and Gutteridge are examples of a significant outcome of the Inquiry’s work, albeit not by design.
“The promotion of criminal investigations and prosecutions is no part of SCAI’s Terms of Reference.
“However, fresh prosecutions of both these paedophiles followed the exposure of their behaviour through the Inquiry’s investigations and presentation of evidence, thereby demonstrating that those who abuse children in care may find it catching up with them, even decades later.
“Keil is not the only example of our work having had this effect.”
Responsibility for the day-to-day running of the boarding houses was left to senior boys with housemasters being distant figures and some boarding house staff considering themselves immune from management.
As a cost saving measure, as well as it being the Keil tradition, responsibility for daily tasks fell to the pupils so senior boys who had been appointed ‘chiefs’, and their deputies, were left to control squads of junior boys with limited supervision, if any.
The attitude of teachers was, largely, that they were there to teach and nothing more than that.
There was an assumption that children could be relied upon to look after the welfare of other children - and to do so without adequate or proper oversight – but that was a serious mistake, particularly since there was no system to ensure consistency across the boarding houses in the school’s approach to child welfare.
Children were exposed to and abused by paedophiles.
Some members of staff physically abused pupils under the guise of it being officially sanctioned punishment. Housemaster Ian Graham stands out and is remembered for his sadistic brutality, within both his house and his classroom.
He conducted mass beatings and used the belt excessively in situations where corporal punishment was never merited. His behaviour was known throughout the school but was never addressed or controlled.
Governance was remote and disconnected from the day-to-day lives of boarders, and governors failed to challenge the situation.
Lady Smith said: “For far too long Keil was a school with inadequate senior leadership and a lack of even the most basic of child protection systems to ensure that children in its care were safe.
“Keil is a remarkable example of naivety and false optimism trumping reality, with the result that children were abused and, in the case of William Bain, abusers had a free rein on a daily basis.”
Since the school closed in 2000, the Mackinnon-Macneill Trust has focused on that part of its purposes which involves promoting the advancement of education; they have not undertaken responsibility for any other school.
The Trust apologised for the abuse experienced by children entrusted to the care of the school. The trustees were appalled by what they learned from the evidence.
Lady Smith said: “Applicants and other witnesses continue to come forward to the Inquiry with relevant evidence about boarding schools and this will be considered as part of a continuing process.
“I would encourage anyone who has relevant information on any aspect of our work to get in touch with our witness support team. We want to hear from you.”