AUSTRALIA
ABC Sydney
[with audio]
Victims of institutional child sexual abuse in Australia continue to question the value of speaking out, even though a Royal Commission into the crimes has begun its work. A total of six commissioners, led by Justice Peter McClelland, held an initial meeting in Melbourne to outline how the Royal Commission will now tackle the process of seeking justice for an epidemic of abuse that has scarred thousands of Australians for decades.
As the Federal government also announced free legal assistance to victims, Tony called 702 Mornings, emotionally shaken as he recounted abuse at the hands of a Catholic brother at a school in Burwood in the early 1960s.
“I thought I’d dealt with it, I thought I’d got over it,” Tony said, his voice shaking as he described the unwelcome memories flooding back.
And to compound the original abuse, Tony said he had found the school unwilling and secretive when he had made an approach hoping to speak to the brother, to seek an apology and offer forgiveness as the “Christian thing to do.”
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