Labor under attack over 'forgotten Australians'

Stuart Rintoul
The Australian
04 october 2011

Human Rights Commission president Catherine Branson has criticised the Gillard government for refusing to take a leadership role on the "forgotten Australians" who were abused as children while in state or church care.

In a letter of support last week to Leonie Sheedy, head of Care Leavers Australia Network, Ms Branson said the abuse of children was clearly a human rights violation and governments had an obligation to promote "the physical and psychological recovery" of child victims.

"I express concern that the commonwealth government has declined to take a leadership role on the issue of redress for these past abuses," Ms Branson said.

Ms Branson said she had received more than 100 often moving letters from former victims of abuse.

She said she had urged Families Minister Jenny Macklin to pursue options through the Council of Australian Governments to establish redress schemes in all states and to ensure those schemes were consistent and inclusive.

Ms Branson's criticism came as abuse victims said that, failing federal action, they would attempt to have their unresolved claims dealt with by the UN Committee Against Torture, as some of Ireland's abuse victims did earlier this year.

In May, a group called Justice for Magdalenes, representing women formerly incarcerated in Ireland's Magdalene Laundries, took their case to the Committee Against Torture, which strongly recommended the Irish government investigate their claims of abuse and provide redress.

Protesting outside the Christian Brothers head office at Parkville in Melbourne yesterday, Ms Sheedy said Australia needed a national reparations fund to overcome the gaps and inequities in state-based funds.

"The feds wash their hands of it and say it's a state issue," Ms Sheedy said.

"But there are a lot of people who have missed out in the state systems."

Victoria and NSW do not have redress schemes. Queensland's scheme, which allows for payments of between $7000 and $40,000, does not apply to people who were abused or neglected in foster care or in institutions outside the scope of the 1998-99 Forde inquiry into abuse of children in the state's institutions.

In July, Ms Sheedy vowed to continue campaigning on behalf of her late brother Anthony, claiming he suffered appalling levels of abuse in state and church care from the age of 2 to 19.

She said yesterday the Christian Brothers had written to the Victorian government offering a "pastoral meeting" to address the issue, but no settlement, which had resulted in the Victorian government reassessing its position.

At least half a million children grew up in more than 500 orphanages, institutions and other out-of-home care in Australia in the 20th century. A Senate report on the "Forgotten Australians" in 2004 said there were "hundreds of graphic and disturbing accounts".