THE elite Knox Grammar installed a memorial to one of its paedophile teachers. It read: “He touched us all”, the child sex abuse royal commission was told today.

One of the victims of art teacher Bruce Barrett said that as a nine-year-old boy he had been confused by the eulogies at Mr Barrett’s funeral and the tributes made for him when he died.

“The fact that he was so well regarded by the school despite being a notorious molester made me feel very confused and powerless,” the former student, Scott Ashton, 44, told the commission today.

Mr Ashton said the school set up memorial gates for Barrett at its Cleveland Street entrance which bore the inscription: “He touched us all.”

The gates remain in place but the section where the memorial was has been removed.

Mr Ashton said his abuse ruined his life and he went into a spiral of sex work, at a time working at the notorious Hellfire Club which specialised in bondage and discipline.

His moving statement was eloquently read to the commission sitting in Sydney by his close friend Gretel Pinniger, better known as the legendary dominatrix Madam Lash.

It was to her that Mr Ashton first revealed he had been a victim of sexual abuse and she has become a close personal friend and support.

“I felt ashamed of my abuse. I was deeply ashamed and unable to discuss it with anyone,” Mr Ashton said in his statement.

“It was an issue which I avoided because any reminder of it would cause me severe stress and interfered with my ability to function and cope on a day-to-day basis.”

At one stage he barricaded himself in his house and the Tactical Response Group had to be called, he told the commission.

He said that Barrett used to chase boys around and tickle them. He was also a “brutal” caner and wore a red tie.

Barrett used to say: “Watch out boys, it’s a red tie day.” That meant there was likely to be some trouble and a caning, Ms Pinniger read out.

Mr Ashton said that one day Barrett chased him around the art class and asked him to remain behind. He thought he was going to be caned, but it was worse. He was sexually assaulted.

Another teacher, Barrie Stewart, openly fondled the genitalia of boys at times including the rehearsal for the school play.

One boy was so distressed, he urinated on the stage. Another was shaking and sobbing uncontrollably, he said.

Meanwhile a man who was abused by a paedophile at Sydney’s prestigious Knox Grammar School said he was surprised to discover the teacher was still employed there 15 years later.

In a statement read to the royal commission hearing, Matthew O’Neal, who was abused by music teacher Barrie Stewart, said when his brother started at the school in 1990, Stewart was still there.

“A gay paedophile in a boys school is like a kid in a candy shop. He should never have been working there,” Mr O’Neal said.

####