AUSTRALIA
WA Today
Cathy Kezelman
April 20, 2012
Opinion
The Victorian parliamentary inquiry into sexual abuse within religious organisations is to be applauded. The long overdue announcement this week by the Baillieu government has come on the back of years of lobbying by victims, their families and victims’ groups.
The report into the appalling number of suicides by victims of clergy abuse in that state has delivered, it appears, the final momentum needed for the inquiry to be announced.
To those of us who work in the child abuse arena, such statistics, while always chilling, are not surprising. A 2008 Victorian study established that survivors of child sexual assault are up to 18 times more likely to commit suicide than people who haven’t been abused.
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