The headmaster of a Perth independent school has told a royal commission into child sex abuse he has no doubt his establishment is safe for children, after a teacher abused boys for years but avoided serious scrutiny.
The royal commission is investigating how the exclusive independent school, which cannot be named for legal reasons, dealt with a series of concerns raised about the behaviour of the teacher known as YJ prior to 2009.
The headmaster of the school, known as WL, on Friday said he had no doubt the school had improved its reporting standards in recent years and was a safer place for children.
"It is my fourth school and I haven't been in one where there has ever been this level of scrutiny," he said.
He said teachers now went through mandatory reporting training through the Association of Independent Schools of Western Australia, as well as a yearly briefing.
The commission in May heard of a series of concerns raised by teachers and parents about YJ's behaviour towards students between 1999 and 2004.
On Friday, a former headmaster of the school, known as WB, said he had received a letter from a teacher called WF in 2002 expressing concern over YJ's behaviour, but did not take any disciplinary action.
"From my perspective and point of view, these were strong expressions of concern and I was treating them as expressions of concern which ought to be responded to professionally and responsibly and immediately with the concerned member of staff," said WB, who was headmaster before 2003.
"I was looking for a positive and professional response to a declared concern."
In 2009, YJ was dismissed from the school, arrested and convicted of molesting former students.
WF's letter, kept on YJ's file, raised concerns he was touching students on the thigh, and stomach, and was giving children gifts such as money.
Later, a teacher known as WH found YJ in a classroom with a boy on his knee and his hand "high up" on a child's thigh.
YJ appealed his conviction, but lost and was re-convicted in 2012.
The hearings into the school - the 12th case study examined by the royal commission - ended on Friday.
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