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Inquiry into Trainees placed on Cult Courses
Glasgow Herald, 9th December 1994
by Alan Gullland
An investigation was under way last night into claims that a businesswoman sent teenage employees on training courses with a controversial religious cult.
The Government-backed Support Training Unit has taken Mrs Eve McAuley, an Edinburgh shop owner, off its list of approved employers pending the outcome.
It acted after a complaint from the mother of a 16-year-old girl who had been placed with Mrs McAuley under the Youth Training Scheme.
Mrs Irene McLay told the unit how her daughter, Jackie, was one of five young girls who were sent on courses run by the Scientology sect.
Over a period of about five months she attended "communications" courses at the cult's Hubbard Academy of Personal Independence in South Bridge, Edinburgh.
But just over a week ago, two members of the cult appeared late at night at the family's home in Newhaven, Edinburgh, to seek permission to take their daughter to their headquarters in East Grinstead, Sussex.
Mrs McLay said: "I didn't really know anything about the Scientology movement. From what I have since learned, I feel very lucky that we've got Jackie back home again."
A spokesman for Support Training Ltd, which is under contract to Lothian and Edinburgh Enterprise Ltd, confirmed last night that it had launched an investigation into the claims.
Mrs McAuley, who runs a dancewear shop in Broughton Street, Edinburgh, last night denied that she had done anything wrong. The four other girls had made no complaint.
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