Zali Steggall (Warringah, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

The Treasury Laws Amendment (The Survivors Law) Bill 2026 is incredibly important legislation. It honours the incredible bravery of so many in coming forward to highlight this problem, people who have already been through so much to get to this point: victims of child sexual abuse.

This bill is built on a simple proposition: a compensation order made by a court should mean something. We would think that goes without saying. It should not be possible for a convicted child sexual abuse perpetrator to hide assets in superannuation, declare bankruptcy and escape accountability. This leaves a survivor holding a court order that is, in practice, worth less than the paper it's written on. Superannuation exists to provide dignity in retirement. It was never intended to become a legal bunker for people seeking to avoid accountability for serious crimes.

The bill establishes a framework for survivors of specified child abuse offences to seek visibility of, and access to, certain superannuation amounts held by perpetrators where compensation remains unpaid. It also amends the Bankruptcy Act so that relevant compensation debts are not extinguished by bankruptcy. This is not about turning superannuation into a general compensation pool. It's targeted. It applies to victims and survivors of specified child abuse offences where there has been a conviction or a finding of guilt, where court has made a compensation order and where that order remains unpaid. The bill does not create compensation from scratch. It makes existing court ordered compensation enforceable by giving survivors a targeted pathway to recover unpaid debts from certain superannuation amounts, sitting alongside proceeds of crime laws rather than replacing them. It's long-overdue reform. Survivors have already had to endure the abuse, the trauma, the legal process and the indignity of chasing accountability through systems that too often exhaust them before they deliver justice.

No community, including mine in Warringah, is immune from the curse and the scourge of child sexual exploitation. Warringah is comprised of communities built around families, schools, sporting clubs, surf clubs, multifaith groups and small businesses, but they are also communities where survivors live, work, study, volunteer, raise families and rebuild their lives.

Nationally, the data is really confronting. The Australian Child Maltreatment Study found that 28.5 per cent of Australians aged 16 and over have experienced child sexual abuse. That's quite confronting—28.5 per cent. It also found that child sexual abuse is often repeated, with 78 per cent of those experiencing it reporting that it happened more than once. And the Australian Bureau of Statistics has also reported that 7.5 per cent of adults experienced sexual abuse before the age of 15, and that the majority of women who experienced childhood sexual abuse never told police. In New South Wales, police-recorded sexual assaults have increased significantly over the past decade, with BOCSAR reporting that recorded child sexual assault incidents increased by around 10 per cent per year over the decade to June 2025.

This is no small problem. These numbers remind us that this is not an abstract legal issue. This is real. It is impacting real lives, and the ongoing consequences are often long and really damaging. It's about people who have already had agency stolen from them, who should not then be forced into another grinding battle simply to enforce a lawful compensation order. So I do very much welcome this legislation.

It's important to be clear, again, that this legislation is not creating a right or a compensation from scratch. Courts can already make compensation orders requiring perpetrators to pay survivors. The problem is that an order does not always mean payment, despite the pain and the difficulty of going through court processes and getting to a compensation order and a finding of guilt through the courts. If a perpetrator refuses to pay, hides money and assets in superannuation or relies on bankruptcy provisions, then survivors can be left without any practical redress despite findings of guilt and compensation orders. So this bill is about enforcement. It helps ensure that a lawful compensation order is not just symbolic but can actually lead to the recovery of funds that will help those survivors.

I've previously spoken in this place about child sexual abuse as one of the most serious violations a person can experience and about the royal commission's finding that institutional child sexual abuse was a national tragedy. I've also supported reforms to make the justice system more victim centred, while making clear that further reform would be needed. The survivors law is one of those further reforms.

The problem this bill addresses is painfully specific. Survivors may obtain a compensation order through criminal or civil proceedings, but, if the perpetrator does not pay, the survivor is left to enforce that order. In some cases, perpetrators have been able to shift wealth into superannuation or rely on bankruptcy in ways that make compensation far harder to recover. And that is, I would argue, a grotesque outcome. The law recognises the harm, and a court has ordered the compensation, yet our system still enables that avoidance of responsibility and payment and denies practical redress to survivors.

Public reporting has shown why reform is needed. Survivors and advocates, including Grace Tame and others, have campaigned for years to close this loophole. In one reported case, survivor Edan Van Haren was awarded $1.4 million in damages while the perpetrator declared bankruptcy and his superannuation remained protected. That's unacceptable.

There are legitimate reasons why superannuation is protected, but in these instances I welcome this legislation change. We need to protect retirement savings. I absolutely agree with that primary position. But we should not have criminals using the superannuation system to hide and move assets around. Again, this is very welcome legislation. The Super Members Council has said that superannuation is a safe haven for the future of most Australians but should not be a safe haven from justice and that the bill strikes the right balance between caution and urgency.

The key question is whether this bill responds proportionally to the problem. The bill creates a pathway for survivors to apply to the Commissioner of Taxation for information about a perpetrator's superannuation. That matters, because survivors often don't know where a perpetrator's superannuation is held or whether there are amounts that may be available. The survivor may then apply to a court for an order releasing certain amounts from superannuation, where compensation remains unpaid after 12 months. It's important to understand that this is distinct from proceeds of crime laws. Proceeds of crime laws are generally about the state confiscating assets linked to criminal offending. This bill is very different. It's about ensuring unpaid compensation reaches survivors. It's targeted and practical, as I've said.

Again, this bill is about accountability. It also addresses bankruptcy. Compensation debts owed to survivors of specified child abuse offences will not be extinguished by a perpetrator's bankruptcy where the relevant criteria are met. That is important. I also welcome the fact that historical compensation orders may be eligible, provided they are still legally enforceable. I hope that finally results in payment to so many that hold compensation orders.

I commend this bill to the House. I thank everyone who has so actively campaigned and advocated for these changes. I can't begin to understand the trauma and the difficulty for so many, but, if this plays a small part in helping gain redress, I welcome it.

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