Stolen Generation children in Darwin to detail 'sexual abuse...

By Ruby Jones
7 News
September 21, 2014

https://au.news.yahoo.com/a/25070123/stolen-generation-children-in-darwin-to-detail-sexual-abuse-emotional-depravation-at-royal-commission/

Barbara Cummings hopes the inquiry will give more Aboriginal people the confidence to speak up.

Stolen Generation children in Darwin to detail 'sexual abuse, emotional deprivation' at royal commission

Stolen Generation children who say they were sexually abused at a Darwin children's home will recall their experiences before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Eighteen witnesses are expected to testify over two weeks of public hearings in the Northern Territory, including nine former residents of the Retta Dixon Home.

The hearings started in Darwin at 10:00am (CST).

The details of their abuse will shock many, according to former resident of the home Barbara Cummings.

"You know this is our home town and people never really, I don't think, realised the horrors that some of these children endured," she said.

"It was all part of that White Australia policy. It was a case of collect all illegitimate part-Aboriginal children, and remove them for the purpose of education.

"My institution was full of physical [abuse], emotional deprivation and sexual abuse.

"We got lots and lots and lots of thrashings, everybody did, for, you know, bucking the system."

She said she hoped the inquiry would give more Aboriginal people the confidence to speak up.

But Ms Cummings said the forum alone was not enough – the victims wanted compensation.

"I think [the witnesses] are the bravest people in the world. You know just like elsewhere: very, very brave," she said.

"There's only a small ... batch but hopefully ... there could be other rounds coming after this time, and others can go through.

"I'm just hoping that the commission will do another couple of rounds, because this is not the core, there is a number of people who want to have what they call their day in court. The commission has to cope with that, so I'm hoping they will come back.

"We want compensation. We have been through the apologies and it's brought us nothing."

Relationships Australia NT chief executive Marie Morrison said many of the witnesses are nervous but eager to find some personal closure through the sharing of their story.

"For some of them, they speak out because they want to contribute to this never happening again," she said. "For some of them, they feel like they will get some personal closure from this."

The Retta Dixon Home was established in the 1930s by Christian missionaries and housed hundreds of children taken from their families who later became known as the Stolen Generations.

The national inquiry will look at three decades of sexual abuse at the home from 1946 until 1980, when it closed.

"It was a home that was instigated to keep children that were part-Aboriginal away from their culture and their language," Ms Morrison said.

The children were promised a better future, but instead it is alleged that Aboriginal children, girls and boys, were sexually abused.

"Some stakeholders who were residents here say it was a very sad time, a very soulless time, and they were treated very harshly," Ms Morrison said.

"It's now known there was sexual abuse as well so it was not a very good place for children to grow up."

Other witnesses that will be called include representatives from the Australian Indigenous Ministries, the federal and Northern Territory governments, police and a former house parent.

This is the first public hearing of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in the Northern Territory, after a year of hearings across the country.