Last week, somewhat belatedly, I received a
response from the Victorian state government regarding a letter I sent in April
calling for a Royal Commission into child sex abuse in the Catholic Church. In
the event, there was nothing much in the return letter, just a reminder of the
fact that a parliamentary inquiry has been established in Victoria – the
Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry Into Sexual Abuse in Religious Orders.
On
Friday – the final day for submissions – the Inquiry received the Catholic
Church’s contribution. Called ‘Facing the Truth’, the submission gives details
of about 620 cases of reported sex abuse by Catholic priests, dating back to
the 1930s but mainly across the 60s, 70s and 80s. What are we to make of this
figure, and the claim that hardly any cases have occurred since the 1980s?
Judy Courtin, a legal researcher who is
doing her PhD on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, told Lateline last week that nobody knows the true numbers, or will ever
know. Her most disturbing observation was that a maximum of just 10% of child
victims report sex abuse to the police. It often takes decades for people
abused as children to make an official complaint. Spokespeople for the victims’
support group In Good Faith have also thrown doubt on the numbers. One told ABC
News 24 that a single Victorian priest was responsible for abusing hundreds of
children over many years. Helen Last, also from In Good Faith, believes the
scale of the problem in this country is comparable to that in Ireland. And that’s
just the Catholic Church.
The
biggest problem with the figure of 620 is that it only reflects cases ‘upheld’
by the Church. It is certain that many more (up to 10,000 according to one
campaigner) exist. The Church’s history of deception and obstruction is
well-known, as is their long-standing policy of moving suspected pedophiles
from parish to parish rather than holding them accountable. Relying on the
Church’s own numbers is, to borrow one law expert’s colourful phrase, to allow
Caesar to judge Caesar. The very fact that it has taken an inquiry of this kind
to compel the Catholic Church to do anything meaningful about these crimes
demonstrates that it is utterly unfit to adjudicate on them.
I’ve made this
point before, but I will make it again because its pertinence to this issue
cannot be understated: no organization other than a religious one would have
been able to get away with such profound inaction, on such profound evils, for
such a long time. Let it not be forgotten in all this that the Catholic Church
is the biggest non-government landholder in Australia and does not pay land
tax, rates or capital gains tax. Let it not be forgotten that the government
provides generous handouts for Catholic schools and Catholic events, such as
World Youth Day back in 2008 to which the federal and NSW governments
contributed $80 million.
Such amounts
bring me back to the question of a Royal Commission. The Gillard government’s
line on this has been that it would be too expensive to mount. In an
overwhelmingly secular country whose government continues to dole out some of
the most generous tax breaks to religions in the world, this position is
farcical. Australian taxpayers are subsidizing minority religious beliefs
everyday. I daresay most, if given the choice, would not begrudge their money
being used to investigate one of the most prolonged and persistent abuses of
power and justice in the history of this country.
A short while
ago, I created a petition via Avaaz calling on the Gillard government to revise
its position on these matters, and immediately convene a Royal Commission into church
child sex abuse. If you have not already done so, please sign the petition, and share it as widely as possible.
No comments:
Post a Comment