WELLINGTON (NEW ZEALAND)
Waikato Times [Hamilton NZ]
July 25, 2024
By David Tombs
When the chair of the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care first delivered her recommendations to the Government two months ago, it came with an appeal to the public.
“The whole country must pay attention when our final report is released and take responsibility to ensure that it never happens again,” Judge Coral Shaw said at the time.
On Wednesday, that report, “Whanaketia – Through pain and trauma, from darkness to light” was released to the public for the first time.
We must all heed Judge Shaw’s advice. We can no longer look away.
The report is a harrowing read. Detailing the biggest, broadest inquiry ever undertaken in Aotearoa New Zealand, spread over 16 volumes and about 3000 pages, it offers a devastating critique of abuses in state and faith-based care in the period from 1950 to 1999.
Judge Shaw has described the scale of abuse as “beyond what anyone had ever imagined” and an “unthinkable national catastrophe”. I can only agree.
Of the estimated 655,000 people who experienced care settings, up to 200,000 of this number experienced abuse. In most cases these abuses were of physical and sexual nature, and it’s believed these numbers may be under-estimates. Some of the experiences at Lake Alice amounted to torture.
The report notes the over-representation of Māori and Pacific children in care representations and in the numbers of those abused. Children with disabilities were particularly vulnerable.
The report also recognises the woefully inadequate response made by state and church agencies when abuse was previously reported.
Often allegations were met with disbelief and denial. In some cases, those who raised concerns were labelled as liars and punished. Children were silenced and victimised for speaking up.
In one damning passage in interim report He Purapura Ora, he Māra Tipu, the Commission condemns both the abuse and the poor response: “It is incomprehensible that human beings could behave like this towards another. What is just as baffling is how those in authority failed in their responses to survivors’ requests for redress.
“It was clear survivors had been deeply harmed by their time in the institutions that were entrusted to care for them. How, in the face of this, could anyone not be shocked and stirred into action?”
One of the answers given to this question is that we were, as a society, collectively “in denial”. State agencies were unable or unwilling to see what should have been clear and unavoidable, and the same can be said for many in the churches.
This is a sad indictment on us all, and particularly those in positions that would have allowed them to take victims’ complaints seriously.
In response to what the inquiry uncovered, a recommendation for an independent redress scheme has been made. The commission hopes that the scheme will be even more ambitious than what has been seen overseas. In addition to financial reparations, there needs to be better provision of wrap-around support services for survivors.
This week, the Prime Minister announced plans for a formal public apology in Parliament on November 12 for “this shameful part of our history”.
Today, as he tabled the report, he too called on all New Zealanders to read the report. Speaking to survivors he said: “You are heard and you are believed.”
For the nation – and especially for the state and New Zealand’s churches – this report will be hard reading. The picture it presents is deeply disturbing.
But facing up to failure cannot be avoided. It clears the way to change.
Churches can play their part by encouraging their members to consider reading the summary between now and Sunday. This will signal the importance of immediately acknowledging the report as an issue for everyone in the churches.
Churches can then plan to read and respond to the report much more fully before November 12.
However we choose to respond, there needs to be an urgent desire to learn from the work that has been done and implement the changes that are needed for a better future in our state systems and churches.