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Posted on March 22, 2014 by lewisblayse
Dear all,
Well, it’s been a long time coming, but the edited film of the Lewis Blayse / Lewin Blazevich public memorial at the University of Queensland on 1 March, 2014 is now available. You can view it at the end of this post.
It was a small, but highly charged event. As well as it being a way of paying public tribute to my father, it was my desire that the event would serve a dual purpose of being an opportunity for key people to reflect on the work of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse on the themes of “Where are we now and where do we need to go from here?” and “The whole world is watching.”
There were a couple of last minute changes in the speaker list.
The people who spoke did so well and passionately. In what follows, I outline in my own words and using the words of the speakers, what was said.
Dr Cathy Kezelman’s (www.asca.org.au) well-considered speech was read out by Nicola Ellis, of Ellis Legal. Cathy spoke on the topic “A time for reflection and hope and optimism.” In her speech, she made several important points. Some of these include:
(a) That while the statistics on child abuse are shocking, we mustn’t forget the humans behind the statistics;
(b) That the long-term effects of child abuse are starting to be understood;
(c) That we’ve stood back and looked the other way for too long;
(d) That we need to help survivors more than we are already;
(e) That Australia is leading the world with the Royal Commission;
(f) That there needs to be greater education on the issues amongst medical professionals; and
(g) That the cost of inaction on child abuse is high – for victims and for communities.
Chris Wilding pulled no punches when she spoke on the topic of “The power of words.” She too made several excellent points, including:
(a) That the institutions in question rely on paid wordsmiths / spin doctors in their communications with the public, but that the true “corporate face” that survivors see is one of a lack of justice and fairness;
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