Former Archbishop of Canterbury tells BBC abuse in Church was 'overwhelming' | BBC News

The former Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby has told the BBC he failed to follow up abuse allegations within the Church of England because the scale of the problem was "absolutely overwhelming".

In November he became the first Archbishop to quit as a result of a scandal in the Church in more than 1,000 years, after a damning independent review found he did not follow up rigorously enough on reports about John Smyth, a serial abuser of children and young men.

In his first interview since resigning, Welby, 68, told the BBC's Laura Kuenssberg that the sheer scale of the problem was "a reason – not an excuse" for his failure to act after taking the job in 2013.

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