Sex abuse redress offers may be 'insultingly low'

AAP (Australian Associated Press) via the Otago Daily Times
June 24, 2018

https://www.odt.co.nz/news/australia/sex-abuse-redress-offers-may-be-insultingly-low

Some child sexual abuse survivors may end up with nothing or "insulting" payments under the $A3.8 billion national redress scheme, advocates warn.

People sexually abused as children in Australian institutions can start applying for redress under the scheme on July 1.

Advocates fear many survivors will be disappointed with their redress offers, given few are expected to receive the $150,000 maximum and previous compensation received from governments or institutions will be taken into account.

Tuart Place director Dr Philippa White said survivors in states such as Western Australia, Queensland and Tasmania that ran their own redress schemes will have those payments deducted from their offers and upscaled for inflation.

"There will be a large number of people who will submit applications in good faith not realising the circumstances of it, and that is that they'll actually be offered nothing or a really insultingly low payment," Dr White told AAP.

"The upscaling is particularly unfair because these aren't payments that reflect anything like the true compensatory value of the terrible abuse they suffered."

The absence of a minimum payment amount and the indexation of prior relevant payments created a "perfect storm" of potential re-traumatisation for national redress scheme applicants, the WA support group for children who grew up in out-of-home care warned.

Dr White said it was quite possible someone could get an offer like $4.20, under the calculation method for the scheme.

"For someone to get an offer like that is deeply distressing," she said.

Dr White said survivors in states that did not run their own redress schemes will probably be in a better position to get some sort of reasonable financial offer.

The $150,000 cap is less than the $200,000 the child abuse royal commission recommended, although the $76,000 average payment is $11,000 higher than its figure.

Australian Lawyers Alliance spokesman Dr Andrew Morrison SC said the amounts under the national redress scheme were really a form of recognition rather than compensation.

"Really for someone who has suffered economic loss, and many of these victims will have suffered lifelong economic loss, those sorts of figures are laughable in terms of adequate compensation," he told AAP.

"But if someone is too traumatised to go to law and run through the courts, and I can understand many of them would be, then at least it offers them some recognition."

All states and territories have committed to the scheme, along with the Catholic, Anglican and Uniting churches, the Salvation Army, the Scouts and the YMCA.

Currently 93 per cent of an estimated 60,000 eligible survivors are covered by the scheme, which also provides access to counselling and a direct personal response from the responsible organisation.