Tonight's Dateline: Judgement Day?

SBS
February 19, 2013

http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/1738476/Tonight%27s-Dateline:-Judgement-Day

[with audio]

Ireland's child abuse inquiry lasted ten years, with some feeling it didn't achieve enough. (SBS)

With the Royal Commission into child sex abuse at institutions in Australia to begin soon, tonight’s Dateline at 9.30pm on SBS ONE looks at the experience of Ireland, which is the only other country to have held a national inquiry.

Reporter Evan Williams hears some of the very personal and distressing stories of abuse in Catholic institutions, with most victims deeply affected into adulthood.

“I was told I would be healed, I’m not healed. I was told open the scars and open up, I did that, and the scars are festering away because I’d been promised so much, and then just left there,” John Kelly, who spent time in a state-funded and Roman Catholic-run children’s institution, tells Evan.

The Irish inquiry was overwhelmed by the number of people that came forward, so some felt they couldn’t tell their full story.

Evan also looks at why no criminal prosecutions against the attackers have followed, with complicated legal issues hanging over the whole process.

It’s left some victims feeling ignored and still unable to find justice.

“The reality is that a very large number of people committed really appalling crimes against children in this State and have not been prosecuted for them, and will not be prosecuted for them,” says Colm O’Gorman, who was abused by a Catholic priest as a teenager and has campaigned on the issue of sexual violence for almost two decades.

So what are the lessons that Australia can learn? And will victims here finally feel their voices are being heard?