I think Joe is, sadly, probably right. Priests won't report what's told them in the confessional and in any case a lot of priests who have been abusing won't confess it in any case - probably because they don't think it's a sin.

I still think, though, that every priest in Ireland must have had some idea that this was going on and chose not to say or do anything about it. Not that it's stopped me being a catholic but if we got a new parish priest who was a middle-aged Irish man I wouldn't be happy about it.