Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the apology, to support the government's statement and the opposition's statement and to add some words on behalf of the Australian Greens. We too apologise for the years of abuse, suffering, trauma, the ongoing trauma, the nightmares and the intergenerational trauma that survivors endured, not just in the past but recent survivors as well. As part of the references committee we heard from survivors who suffered recent abuse through institutions. We need to remember that this is ongoing. We apologise for the fact that survivors were subjected to institutional abuse by people that abused the power that they had over innocent young people; institutions that these children thought they should be able to put their respect in and that they could trust. That trust was abused.

Just last week I was in Newcastle. We heard from survivors. We were talking about redress, which I will come back to. People spoke of the fear of answering the door, of the nightmares that they suffered and of the lifelong sentence that people were given through this abuse. We heard of the powerful disincentives to disclose. So we are sorry and we apologise. We also apologise to the prisoners that are currently in our justice system as a result of the abuse that they endured as children in institutions. We apologise to those who were originally going to be excluded from the redress system because of the failure to understand the impact of abuse and its close association with addiction, which leads to interactions with the justice system.

Not only was young children's trust abused, but the abuse occurred again when they were not believed. When they sought to tell people in authority, whether it was the people in authority in the institutions, sometimes it was their parents who actually believed the abusers rather than their own children. We apologise to those children as well.

I know there are lots of quotes that have been used while we have been discussing the apology. When I was in Newcastle just last week, I was given a book by a survivor. It's called Our Little Secret, by Lorraine Hall. I thought that I would quote from her experiences in her book. She said: 'The title of Our Little Secret relates to the shame I felt holding the secret of my abuse. The secrets we hold cause a double bind, meaning the perpetrator will often show attention and love to the victim and then harm the victim. We, as victims, deny a certain aspect of the reality of the abuse and are often confused about love and our attachment to the perpetrator. Survivors take it to be their fault, their shame. Perpetrators hold authoritarian power over us as children and often into our adulthood, rendering their victims powerless. Feelings such as being worthless and not good enough are always present, either in our behaviours or our beliefs about ourselves. Perpetrators either say or imply keeping a secret of the abuse. Secrets are like a curse in as much as the guilt and shame we hold in our self-beliefs. We cannot see shame, but it perpetrates into our mental, spiritual and emotional beliefs about ourselves, right down to our cellular memory. We also hold it in our bodies. What survivor doesn't have feelings or thoughts of being powerless, worthless, not good enough and all alone? Shame and the double bind has been a huge part of my journey, to realise none of it was mine. I needed to take responsibility for myself and let go of these negative beliefs and patterns that I took on. It was not and never was ours or my secret or my fault.'

That is what we also acknowledge and want to say to survivors: it was not your fault. It was not your fault that the abuse occurred. It was not your fault that you were not believed. But you are believed now. We, as a nation, believe you. We, as a nation, are apologising for the abuse. We also need to make sure that we do everything that we can to make sure that child abuse is stamped out in this country—that we have the processes in place to ensure that this is a thing of the past, that we protect and support our children.

One of the key issues that has not been picked up, although apologies have been given—I've heard them—regards those who were not covered by the royal commission; those who suffered physical abuse in institutions that is not classed as sexual abuse. Many, many children were abused in institutions, although it is not classed as sexual abuse. That has also led to years of trauma, and we apologise to you for the abuse that you suffered at the hands of those powerful people in institutions. There was a quote I heard just recently—in fact, in Newcastle—'Trauma sticks, shifts and changes,' which is why we need to acknowledge that the abuse that children suffered has lifelong impacts and the trauma suffered sticks, but it also can change, depending on the circumstances that people confront, and it can shift.

I want to talk about the things that perhaps haven't been talked about. We have spoken about the need for redress and to make sure this doesn't happen again, but there are some issues that are still yet to be resolved that survivors are asking us to address. First, I want to address the issues around redress. We need to make sure that the actions we take as a nation to offer redress, in terms of addressing and offering support to people, are not retraumatising people. For example, people have spoken about the retraumatising aspect of needing to fill in a form to apply for redress. The Prime Minister has acknowledged that part 3 of the form has caused some trauma, but the amendments that are being made, according to survivors, do not go far enough. A very simple point has been made: that there should be a note on the form saying, 'Do not fill this in alone,' because it is very likely that filling it in will have very significant impacts. Things like going to a session or a counselling session with someone to help you fill in the form—being much more flexible about the way we address the form and gathering the information that is required for redress.

The issue around counselling is one that many people want us to address. I've spoken about the trauma that shifts, that sticks, that changes; the intergenerational trauma; the life-long trauma; and the impacts of PTSD. We need to make sure that we have counselling support for survivors for as long as they live. That means not putting a money limit on the amount of counselling that is received. That means making sure that we offer top-quality trauma-informed counselling. These are the issues that survivors have asked us to raise, and we, as a nation, need to continue that conversation to ensure that we're offering those supports.

As has been touched on in other contributions here today and a fortnight ago, the fact that some institutions have for years and years essentially operated as protection rackets needs to be recognised and acknowledged. We need to make sure that institutions are opting in to the Redress Scheme, are acknowledging their role and are no longer continuing to protect people in high places.

We need to go to those hard places that are, in fact, the recommendations that the government is still continuing. These issues are hard—I'm not denying it—but we, as a nation, have to go there. We also need to address issues like the confessional. As a nation, we need to recognise that we need to put children's safety first. Another issue that has been raised with me by survivors is that it still causes deep pain and trauma to see the names of their abusers who have been given honours, and our failure to deal with that. I acknowledge that we need to address that issue, and the Greens commit to making sure that we are addressing that issue.

We, as a nation, are sorry. We are sorry for what happened. We are sorry for not believing. We are sorry for the ongoing trauma and the intergenerational trauma. We also know that this abuse has had not only lifelong impacts but impacts on families. It has torn families apart. It has impacted on children. It has impacted on grandchildren.

We need to follow through on the commitments that we have made to ensure that we get redress right, to ensure that we hold institutions and the people in those institutions to account, to ensure that this does not happen again and to ensure that we help people on their healing journey and acknowledge that they will need to continue to be supported and that there will be ongoing issues in their lives. For example, many people have articulated their deep fear of institutions. What impact will that have on their life in the future? For example, many survivors are ageing. How do we support people in the future as they age? These are all issues that as part of our apology we acknowledge we need to take on and address.

Let me finish with the deep sense of sorrow and grief that we as a nation have felt. We as a nation articulate our support for survivors and our deep apology for the years of abuse, suffering and trauma that they have endured.