AUSTRALIA
ABC News
Mandatory reporting policies do not go far enough to protect children from sexual abuse, a royal commission has heard.
The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is examining a prestigious Perth private school’s response to allegations of inappropriate conduct by a teacher dating back to 1999.
The teacher, referred to as YJ, was jailed for five years in 2010 for sexually abusing five students.
The school and its staff cannot be identified.
Professor Stephen Smallbone, a psychologist and Griffith University professor who specialises in the prevention of child sexual abuse, told the commission that mandatory reporting, which came into effect in 2009, does not adequately address the grooming of children prior to abuse.
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