Part Four: Jimmy Savile: Britain's Unending Nightmare

In 1988, the entire management board of Broadmoor Psychiatric Hospital was suspended by the Thatcher administration, and the task force appointed to run it was headed by Jimmy Savile. The junior health minister Edwina Curry rubber-stamped the decision, later conceding in her diaries that Savile's plans for "reform" included union-busting—which she acknowledged was likely Savile blackmailing staff who could blow the whistle on his abuse. The hospital gave Savile a permanent private apartment in the women's wing, where staff would sometimes deliver patients to his room. This was not a side project. Savile was a significant, meaningful part of Thatcherism.

The Duncroft Pipeline

The Duncroft approved school for girls was an experimental facility that used psychotherapy to "correct the behavioral defects" of troubled girls—primarily the daughters of prominent and wealthy families. Girls were sent there for a variety of reasons: some had been victims of sexual abuse and were punished for having sex underage; others were sent for drug use, anorexia, attempted suicide, or running away from abusive homes. The headmistress, Margaret Jones, absolutely loved Jimmy Savile.