Victims want church held accountable

Sky News
May 25, 2015

http://www.skynews.com.au/news/top-stories/2015/05/25/victims-want-church-held-accountable.html

Victims of the worst clergy abuse in Australia's history want church leaders to be held accountable.

Lawyer and Monash University doctoral researcher Judy Courtin says the fact church figures who covered up abuse have not been held accountable adds to the harm to victims.

'The ongoing response of the church, which is one of contempt or disdain, is causing ongoing harm to the victims,' Ms Courtin told AAP in Ballarat.

Ms Courtin, who has worked closely with abuse survivors in the Ballarat diocese and conducted wider research into justice for clergy abuse victims, said survivors want the whole truth to come out that goes further than what the offenders themselves did.

'It was much more important to have accountability of the hierarchy on the concealing than accountability of the offender,' she said.

She said a lack of convictions in Australia for concealing abuse meant church figures enjoyed impunity.

The child sex abuse royal commission is conducting a public hearing as part of its investigation into the Catholic Church's response to abuse in the Ballarat diocese.

Several notorious pedophiles operated in the diocese, including Australia's worst pedophile priest, Gerald Francis Ridsdale, who will give evidence to the commission via videolink for at least two days from Wednesday.

Lawyer Viv Waller - who acts for 26 victims of Ridsdale, 10 of whom have issued individual common law claims for compensation - says she expects more victims to come forward from the royal commission's work.

'Now is the time for people to come forward whilst the royal commission has really levelled up the playing field,' Ms Waller told AAP.

'The royal commission's power of subpoena to get these documents means for the first time in history these victims are not on the back foot trying to get to the truth.'

The investigation has uncovered evidence that church figures knew of the abuse in the early 1960s.

The second week of the Ballarat hearing opens on Monday with University of NSW Associate Professor Carolyn Quadrio.

It is the first time the commission has heard evidence from a psychiatrist with particular expertise in the consequences of sexual abuse including by clergy.