AUSTRALIA
The Guardian
Australian Associated Press
Thursday 6 August 2015
Cardinal George Pell should give evidence to the child abuse royal commission in Ballarat, not Melbourne, Victorian premier Daniel Andrews has said.
The commission has moved the second stage of public hearings into clergy abuse in the Ballarat diocese to Melbourne for logistical reasons, but Ballarat MPs want the former local priest’s evidence to be heard in the regional city.
“I’m confident that the royal commission will do the right thing and come and hear evidence that is directly relevant to the people of Ballarat in that great city,” Andrews told reporters on Friday.
The premier said it was respectful and appropriate to hear at least the most high-profile witnesses in Ballarat.
“The people of Ballarat, survivors and their families, those who’ve spent so much time dealing with the grief and the pain and the loss of this terrible abuse, I think they’re entitled to hear evidence in their own local area,” he said.
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