AUSTRALIA
The Australian

[Submissions to the Victoria inquiry]

Paul Mulvey
From: AAP
October 26, 2012

AS Victoria’s assistant police commissioner gave condemning evidence against the Catholic Church, sexual abuse victims and their families were brought to tears.

But for once in this shameful saga, they weren’t sad tears.

“It was because a senior member of the community was finally sticking up for us. Telling it like it is,” one survivor told AAP.

Telling it “like it is” paints a shocking picture.

Victoria’s parliamentary inquiry into church sexual abuse has heard one in 20 Catholic priests are child abusers (and the figure could be higher among Christian Brothers), the church has never referred any allegation to police, it’s more worried about its reputation than the victims’ welfare, is secretive and intimidating, ill equipped to deal with the scourge of sexual abuse and needs a dramatic change in…