Abuse Survivors Welcome Compensation Settlement over Retta Dixon Home in Darwin

By Bridget Brennan and Avani Dias
ABC News
March 30, 2017

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-30/survivors-welcome-compensation-over-retta-dixon-home-abuse/8398590

Compensation for years of physical and sexual abuse at a notorious home for Aboriginal children will provide relief but will never erase the trauma of what happened, former residents say.

A landmark class action will compensate 71 people around the country, who suffered horrific abuse at the Retta Dixon home in Darwin between 1947 and 1980.

"I am feeling happier, [there's] closure, because I know that there are people who care for us," former resident Marjorie Winphil said.

PHOTO: Former Retta Dixon resident Marjorie Winphil says the settlement gives her closure. (ABC News: Tristan Hooft)

Another abuse survivor, Becky Curtis, said the action was a "release" for many.

"It's never been about the money, it's been about (making) people accountable for what they've done," she said.

Lawyers said the settlement — finalised out-of-court — was only the second of its kind in Australia.

It is also the first class action to be paid by the Commonwealth, following a public hearing at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

The other defendants paying compensation are a convicted paedophile and Australian Indigenous Ministries, the organisation which ran the home.

The group's lawyer, Darwin solicitor Bill Piper, said the children were effectively wards of the state at a time when the Northern Territory was being administered by the Commonwealth.

PHOTO: A dormitory in the Retta Dixon Home, a mission boarding school for Indigenous children in Darwin in 1958. (National Archives)

"It was decided that a case could be run against the Commonwealth as their ultimate guardian, and the mission into whose care the Commonwealth placed the children," he said.

Melbourne lawyer Angela Sdrinis, who represents hundreds of institutional abuse victims, said the Retta Dixon case was a "very important development".

"I think we will be seeing more group or class actions against the Commonwealth," Ms Sdrinis said.

'Someone finally listened'

Sydney woman Sandra Kitching, who was taken to Retta Dixon in the late 1950s, said she felt the settlement meant "someone finally listened to our story".

"It has absolutely taken a lot of burden off our shoulders," she said.

"To get it over and done with, we've had it on our minds for 60 years, we're pretty happy with it," she said.

Many of the Retta Dixon children were forcibly removed from their parents as part of the Stolen Generations, including Margaret Shields who lived on Humpty Doo station in Darwin's rural area until she was seven.

PHOTO: Margaret Shields lived in Darwin's rural area until she was forcibly removed from her parents. (ABC News: Tristan Hooft)

Her family would hide from a patrol officer who was taking children from families on the station.

"We kept running away from him, we knew, we got signs from other families that he was there, we kept running day and night ... it was nerve wracking, it was terrible," she said.

"One day we were very tired and we stayed at the station and he came along and grabbed me and my nephew and took us and put us in the van, and the families were all crying."

"We were leaving the station and we looked back and it was very sad, I felt sick in my stomach."

Ms Shields said when she arrived at Retta Dixon, she felt relieved to see children but could not understand what was going on.

"I couldn't understand English, I was really frightened," she said.

Mr Piper said cases challenging the assimilation policy in the Northern Territory had been run and lost before, and stressed the Retta Dixon was not a Stolen Generations action.

He said it was a test run on whether what happened to the children once they were put into the home "would be unlawful, or could be seen to be actionable".

'We can all get on with it now'

PHOTO: Brothers Mark and John Saxby were taken from their mother in 1963. (ABC News: Gordon Faud)

John Saxby and his brother Mark were abused at Retta Dixon after they were removed from their mother in Darwin in 1963.

"It's been a long hard journey, but it's good to see that justice has been done in a manner, and we can all get on with it now," John Saxby said.

Mark Saxby, 58, said he felt "a great sense of relief" the case has been finalised, and said he could now see a light at the end of the tunnel.

"I've seen light before, but not as bright as this one," Mr Saxby said.

After a public hearing in 2014, the royal commission found Australian Indigenous Ministries did not meet the obligations it had to children in its care, including to protect them from sexual abuse.

The commission heard some children had been raped and brutally beaten, and as adults the abuse had serious effects on their mental health, employment and relationships.

Settlement may spur other class actions

Ms Sdrinis said there had only been one other institutional child abuse class action in Australia, for the Fairbridge Farm school child migrants.

She said class actions were potentially an option for individuals making similar claims, including other victims of abuse, Aboriginal groups who were under the control of the Commonwealth as children, and child migrants.

"Whilst [the Retta Dixon case] is not a legally binding precedent, because we don't have a court decision, it does show that defendants like the Commonwealth are prepared to consider resolving claims as a group in this way."

The Federal Government has said a national redress scheme will be running by 2018.