Uniting Church Paid $2m to Sex Abuse Victims

By Stuart Rintoul and Pia Akerman
The Australian
April 23, 2013

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/uniting-church-paid-2m-to-sex-abuse-victims/story-e6frg6nf-1226626423599

THE Uniting Church has told a Victorian child abuse inquiry that it has paid about $2 million in compensation to abuse victims arising from 63 complaints in Victoria and Tasmania dating back to the 1940s.

But the Victorian parliamentary inquiry heard that the most recent allegation involving the "criminal abuse of children" was made in September last year, among seven more recent cases.

The church's legal adviser, Philip Battye, said many of the historic abuse cases involved the Tally Ho Methodist boys home, which closed in 1986, but many of the home's records had been lost or destroyed.

Mr Battye said of the 63 cases spanning the 1940s to the late 80s, a "smaller rather than larger" number had been referred to police, only one involved clergy and two-thirds of the alleged perpetrators were not church employees but people involved with church homes.

In its evidence to the inquiry, the Anglican Church said it had records of 46 complaints against clergy and church workers and has paid out compensation of $268,000 in the past 10 years.

Anglican Archbishop Philip Freier said the church was unable to change the past, but strove "to have the most robust procedures in place so that the risk of harm to children is reduced as much as possible . . . We believe what Jesus says when he taught 'The truth will set you free'.

"Public scrutiny is to be applauded when it brings shameful matters to light," Archbishop Freier said in a statement.

"I acknowledge that people's faith has been severely questioned and challenged during this process, which is to be expected in such circumstances. However, I want to give the assurance that there are good people doing good things to assist victims."

Archbishop Freier recalled "the chill of fear that I experienced when it was revealed that a teacher at my son's primary school -- in another part of Australia -- was a sexual predator of other boys in his class".

"I have listened to a victim of child sexual abuse in the church tell me how a predatory minister insinuated himself into the confidence of his family so that children of that family came to be entrusted to the predator's care and how this trust was betrayed and a vulnerable child abused," he said.

Archbishop Freier said it would be "sensible" to make it a criminal offence to conceal abuse.