AUSTRALIA
J-Wire
March 18, 2013 by J-Wire Staff
The Executive Director of The Executive Council of Australian Jewry, Peter Wertheim and Immediate Past President, Robert Goot, have met with the Chair of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
Chair Justice Peter McClellan, briefed Wertheim and Goot about the way the Commission will operate, the resources available to it and time estimates for completing various phases of the Inquiry.
“The Chairman made it clear that religious communities and religious schools will not be the exclusive focus of the Inquiry, but they will necessarily be included in the spread of institutions covered”, Wertheim said.
“Some other key points to emerge from the briefing:
•The first sitting of the Royal Commission is scheduled for 3 April in Sydney.
•There will be both public hearings and private sessions with 1 or 2 Commissioners.
The private sessions are for people with information who do not want for any reason
to give evidence at a public hearing.
•Information from private sessions will not be evidence or the foundation for any
finding. However, such information might result in a referral to the Police or be used to guide further investigations of institutions or individuals. Such institutions or individuals will be notified beforehand of any potentially adverse information against them and will be accorded procedural fairness.
•There will be no findings of abuse per se, only findings about institutional and cultural failures in preventing and dealing with abuse.
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