AUSTRALIA
The Guardian (UK)
Australian Associated Press
theguardian.com, Thursday 3 July 2014
A prominent Catholic lawyer says the child abuse royal commission has set up unreal compensation expectations among victims.
Frank Brennan, who is professor of law at the Australian Catholic University, also says there are many risks in a long-running royal commission.
On Monday in its interim report, the commission said it would need a two-year extension and an extra $104m to finish its job. This would take it to December 2017.
It said a priority would be a compensation scheme for victims.
In an article for the online journal Eureka Street the Jesuit priest describes the commission’s statistics on abuse claims in Catholic church institutions as “frightening and shaming”, and says: “The commission has provided a safe space for victims to come forward and tell their stories.”
But he argues the commission is setting impossible questions for witnesses around compensation.
He says under recent Australian law there are limits to the extent to which an organisation will be vicariously liable for one of its employees sexually abusing a child.
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