Maryborough-based Fairfax journalist, Caleb Cluff, travelled to Canberra to witness the National Apology to victims and survivors of Institutionilised Sexual Abuse. This is his perspective.
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There’s been some criticism of the national apology and redress scheme. Critics have suggested there is not enough asked or being required of those who are applying for recompense; That it’s ‘too easy’ to rip off the system. That they’re free loaders rorting the process.
I sat in the great hall of the federal parliament for the apology with 400 other people. We arrived at 9am for morning tea and listened to classical guitarist in the members hall.
We stood around feeling awkward. It was clear many people knew each other, had spoken together, worked together, cried together. Many had suffered together.
There was not one person there who I saw who wanted to be there. Or I should say, they wanted to be at the apology, but only because something so dreadful, so unspeakable happened to them in the past, in their childhood, that they felt they had to bear witness to their lives publicly.
What I’m saying is I saw no person who was likely to be making their story up.
There was no person there who wanted to relive what happened to them. It’s hard to describe the collective pain that I witnessed inside the hall on Monday.
Faces lined prematurely with grief and anger and sadness. Some people with broken bodies; almost every one of them with a broken heart.
We listen to an extraordinary welcome to country by Ngambri-Guumaal elder Minku Shane Mortimer.
He speaks passionately, off the cuff. He pulls out some notes but never refers to them. Instead he tells his own family history, the story of nine generations of women, each one devastated by removal and abuse. He then exhorts assembled people to remember why they are here, why they have survived. He holds every person in the room spellbound. It’s an astonishing performance, people are silent.
The speeches by the Prime Minister and the opposition leader are matters of record now. They are not the stories I want to tell. You can find them anywhere. I’m sure they’ll be all over the media.
I want to tell you the story of James, who sat down next to me at the apology. James is a timber cutter from central Victoria. He’s a remarkably handsome man, muscular. His first question to me is, ‘Are you alright mate?’
We listen to the speeches, and in between we talk. We talk about what happened to James: the institutional abuse, the boy’s homes, the insecurity.
How his life was blighted by self-doubt, how he turned to violence and alcohol because his value was stripped from him, how he never spoke, because the words would never come out.
He’s still struggling, but he can talk. He’s in a new suit, new shoes. He’s come a long way for the apology.
At the end of the apology, Scott Morrison and Bill shorten, attorney-general Christian Porter and the speaker of the house come into the Great Hall. Morrison and Shorten speak again, less parliamentary formality, more intimacy.
But the greatest accolade, a standing ovation and cheers, is reserved for the former prime minister Julia Gillard, the politician responsible for the Royal Commission into Institutionalised Child Sexual Abuse. She’s invited to speak by the age discrimination Commissioner Kay Patterson. She speaks briefly.
She sat with survivors in the gallery in parliament for the apology because, she says, “that’s where I wanted to be.”
Helplines:
Loddon Campaspe Centre Against Sexual Assault 5441 0430
Sexual Assault Crisis Line 1800 806 292 (24hrs)
1800Respect (National Sexual Assault, Family and Domestic Violence Counselling Line) Tel. 1800 737 732
Kids Helpline (kidshelpline.com.au) Tel. 1800 55 1800
DHHS Child Protection Intake North Division Intake - 1300 664 977
SOCIT – Sexual Offences Child Investigative Team – 5444 6701
After hours child protection emergency service - 13 12 78