MONTROUGE (FRANCE)
La Croix International
May 30, 2018
The Catholic Church is bringing all its religious congregations and dioceses under one company to make it easier to make payouts
The Australian Catholic Bishops Conference and Catholic Religious Australia confirmed on Wednesday that the Catholic Church would join a national redress scheme for child sexual abuse survivors and share in compensation, reports 9 News.
“We support the royal commission’s recommendation for a national redress scheme, administered by the Commonwealth, and we are keen to participate in it,” said Archbishop Mark Coleridge, the Australian Catholic bishops president.
The Catholic Church had called for the national redress scheme since 2013, the archbishop said.Social Services Minister Dan Tehan said the scheme, if passed by the Senate, is to begin on July 1.
“The Catholic Church obviously had institutions, churches under its control where terrible, terrible, shocking abuse took place,” 9 News reported him telling media people in Canberra.
The Catholic Church was bringing all its religious congregations and dioceses under one company to make it easier to make payouts, he said.”We’re talking tens of millions of dollars,” Tehan reportedly said.
While Sister Ruth Durick, Catholic Religious Australia president said “We are committed to providing redress to survivors who were abused within the Catholic Church,” Archbishop Anthony Fisher of Sydney said “We’re determined to bring justice and full redress – healing, if we can – to the victims of this terrible crime.
“Archbishop Fisher, without specifying an estimated amount, said the church expected to be paying out survivors for “many years to come,” the report said.
Legislation to enable the $3.8 billion opt-in scheme passed federal parliament’s lower house on May 29.
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