Source document: https://docs-lawep.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/1697642961076.pdf (Australia)
I request that my identity be withheld in the interests of my son’s mental health and safety.
Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2017 and related bill Inquiry into the Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2017 and Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2017 Dear Community Affairs Legislation Committee, I write to you as a mental health professional with forty-five years of practice, much of which has been devoted to the treatment of adults who have experienced childhood sexual abuse and their families.
I also write to you as the mother of a son (now in his mid-forties) who was sexually abused as a child while attending a national recreational service organization.

My son has experienced depression and suicidal thoughts since the age of seven and has required ongoing family support outside of the norm.

I write to you in the hope that the proposed redress scheme will provide a positive way forward for not only primary and secondary survivors but also for the institutions where the abuse occurred.
It is my hope that this will be a pathway to healing and reconciliation.

I write to you to express some grave concerns, informed by my clinical practice and my lived experience, that I have regarding the current proposal.

My concerns are these: 1.

1) The exclusion of families of primary victims is a flawed if not a dangerous decision.
It would appear, from public comments of The Honorable Christian Porter made to ABC AM, that this decision has been made on economic grounds and not on good clinical evidence.

This is despite findings of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that family members often experience mental illness outcomes similar to primary victims.
It is my professional opinion that this exclusion will have some serious consequences: The current proposal is narrow and fails to acknowledge the ongoing suffering of families of primary victims.

If this exclusion occurs, justice will not be served for many families who require and deserve access to treatment that is trauma-focused and is informed of the special needs of this group.
Many of these families have experienced years of major disruption and the breakdown of familial relationships, leaving families in dysfunction and with chronic grief and trauma.

Many families have been supporting a primary victim for years without the knowledge of the abuse until recently.
1 Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2017 and related billSubmission 71 2) 3) 4) It is clear from the findings of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that many primary survivors often do not disclose their abuse until middle age, if at all.
It has also become obvious that disclosure generally occurs over a number of years and not as one single event so that when families become aware of the past abuse, this disclosure often does not extend to authorities and treatment facilities, leaving the family members as the only supporters of the survivor.

It is imperative to the welfare of primary victims that professional counselling be provided to families so they can process their own trauma and be informed on how best to assist the survivor.
The primary survivor’s attendance in treatment should not be a perquisite to families being afforded trauma-focused treatment.

It is important that families have the option of receiving an apology and reassurance of better practice from the institution that is responsible for their child’s abuse.

This is extremely important for their recovery.


If families are not afforded the opportunity to heal through counselling and an apology process, their unresolved grief will be detrimental to their healing their relationship with the primary survivor and their own healing.

2.

I see no justification for the exclusion from the scheme of primary survivors who have a strong criminal history.
This does not afford them natural justice and fails to recognize that childhood sexual abuse is a factor in a person’s developing at-risk behaviour that often leads to a criminal career.

This exclusion introduces a principle of deserving and not deserving that the scheme can do without.

3.

The requirement that the abuse occurred when the primary victim was under the age of eighteen fails to acknowledge the added vulnerability to abuse that occurs for persons with cognitive and other impairment.
It also fails to recognize that for many, the abuse, commencing in childhood and adolescence, often extends into adulthood because of the power imbalance that is operating.

(See Mary Rose MacColl: “For a Girl”) 4.

That the abuse must occur in the premises of the institution fails to acknowledge that the perpetrator of the abuse may be using their position in the institution to abuse children off the premises e.g.

the priest who visits a family of the parish regularly.
Many perpetrators use an institution to ingratiate themselves into families, grooming those families as well as their victim.

5.

When a primary survivor has experienced abuse from two or more institutions, shouldn’t they be entitled to an apology from all of those institutions?

6.

In administering the counseling service to survivors, care needs to be taken in ensuring a minimum of administration and maximum openness in decision- making about treatment entitlement.
Survivors, including families, generally will 2 Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2017 and related billSubmission 71 have major issues with authority and will be mistrustful of institutions.

Consumer–driven care needs to be the driving principle.

Treatment options should include the not-for-profit agencies that have been providing counselling and wrap-around services for a number of years.
Many survivors will trust these organizations over an individual private practitioner in a more formal clinical setting.

7.

Many survivors have poor attendance when seeking counselling because of the nature of their illness.

This becomes a disincentive for private practitioners to continue to treat them.

Some compensation for missed appointments as occurs with VVCS should be considered to ensure retention of a skilled workforce.

8.
8.

Documentation of a survivor’s historical involvement with an institution as an eligibility requirement for redress may be problematic unless clear government expectations of institutions are put in place.

The institution where my son’s abuse occurred has indicated to me that they do not have archived records of his attendance during the period when the abuse occurred.

9.

The Honorable Christian Porter has indicated to ABC AM that the counselling cost will be capped at $5000 per person.
The manager of a current redress scheme operating for a number of years has indicated to me this is grossly inadequate.

Many of the survivors will require counselling and wrap around services for the rest of their lives.

Encouraging a survivor to “tell all” in counseling and then prematurely cease that counselling before they have the opportunity to process it, may lead to suicide.

10.
10.

The proposed ten-year duration of the scheme and that the abuse must have occurred before the commencement of the scheme clearly will exclude 1) 2) Survivors who have been abused prior to the commencement of the scheme who do not come forward with a complaint within the ten years of the scheme.

Children who are abused after the commencement of the scheme are currently excluded.
While some institutions are already putting in place safeguards for the safety of children, there has already been some indication from some institutions that the will to be vigilant about possible sexual abuse of children has not been learnt.

So government must ensure that external ongoing pressure be placed on these institutions to ensure that they behave in a responsible manner putting safeguards in place for the safety of children and responding appropriately to reports of abuse.
An ongoing financial commitment through a redress scheme will provide an incentive for good practice.

11.The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse’s commissioning a review of professional literature on the long-term effects of child sexual abuse on families of primary survivors indicated that very little professional literature exists.
This professional neglect perhaps reflects society’s views of those families as being somewhat lacking in parenting that these things occurred coupled with families’ tendency to not disclose and seek appropriate care for themselves because of the shame and protection of their primary 3 Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2017 and related billSubmission 71 survivor member.
However, families giving evidence at the Royal Commission provided sound evidence of the ripple effect of the trauma.

Some good unpublished clinical knowledge exists with current service providers in this country.

I urge the government to insist that pre-requisite training for registered providers include exposure to this clinical wisdom.

4 Commonwealth Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Bill 2017 and related billSubmission 71