Those six little words meant the world to me: not because of what he actually said, but because of what the words meant. And because of how and where my lovely Dad came up with them. I’d been sitting in a little room at Middlesbrough Crown Court for four days. My Dad was on trial: someone had finally got round to doing something about his repeated sexual abuse of me from the age of three. I’d spoken to the police and to lawyers off and on throughout my years in Care, but Dad had denied everything. To hear his side of the story he’d never laid a finger on me – even though I’d been a really difficult child – and he’d even taken me into his home when Mum couldn’t cope with me any more. And of course he hadn’t abused me; he wasn’t one of those bastard paedophiles. And so nothing was done. When it’s the word of a respectable local businessman against that of a young girl so troubled that she had been kicked out by her mum and eventually taken into Care, guess who comes out on top?