Long awaited report into Tasmanian child sex abuse made public
The Tasmanian government has vowed to implement all the recommendations from the commission of inquiry's final report into child sexual abuse in institutional settings after it was made public.
Transcript
00:00 It's obviously been a very mixed reaction. For these survivors, it's been such a big
00:06 build up. Some of them, their abuse dates back two decades and you've got to think it's
00:11 not just the abuse that ruined their lives, but the systems that failed to protect them
00:18 and then failed to believe them. It's people from across education, health, out of home
00:25 care and the youth detention centre all waiting for this one thing. Yesterday, most of them
00:32 didn't actually get to the report from when we'd spoken to them. They were following the
00:38 Premier's speech in which, yes, he did promise to enact all 191 recommendations. A lot of
00:47 them were hoping for more. Of course, that was just a 40-minute speech, so obviously
00:52 couldn't go across a document that literally weighs 14 kilograms altogether. Some of them
00:59 said it really, really spoke to their experience, but they felt like it got lost in numbers
01:05 and promises. I think one of the reactions that did unite everyone was in relation to
01:12 the Ashley Youth Detention Centre. Now, it's really interesting because obviously, as I
01:15 said, this covers a broad range of institutions, but everyone's come together on this opinion
01:20 that the Ashley Youth Detention Centre needs to close as soon as possible. Now, that's
01:24 something that the commission has recommended. They say it needs to be done urgently. The
01:30 government has promised they'll close it as soon as possible, but they say that's the
01:33 end of 2024. A lot of the survivors feel like, even if they're most of the month survivors
01:39 of Ashley themselves, they feel like that needs to happen now. They can't understand
01:44 why an institution that only has, I think sometimes it's somewhere between, let's say,
01:50 eight to 15 people in it, why that can't be dealt with now, when the commission has found
01:54 that it is a live and current risk. One of the women who was abused in foster care spoke
02:01 out. She said there didn't seem to be enough immediate ways to deal with the threats in
02:07 foster care. She's concerned other children are suffering the same abuse. What others
02:12 have said, they have a lot of hope. There are a lot of documents and bureaucratic things
02:20 to be implemented, but survivors are hoping this is a real turning point for the state.
02:27 I think the mother of one woman whose daughter was abused, she's no longer with us, she said
02:32 that she hopes that this is the moment that we say Tasmania has changed and Tasmania has
02:39 stopped and is able to prevent abuse, not just react to it. It was really validating
02:45 as well, I think, for a lot of people. It's said that too often our reactions to sexual
02:52 abuse allegations had been inadequate. Our systems were ineffective with dealing with
02:57 it and we didn't have a culture that encouraged feedback and reporting. I saw the reaction
03:04 of one woman who actually got a chance to look at the report. She's a social worker.
03:09 She was abused as a child by pedophile nurse, James Jeffrey Griffin. She went on as an adult
03:18 to go and work at the Launceston General Hospital. When she got there, James Jeffrey Griffin
03:24 was working as a nurse on the children's ward and she reported her abuse to the Launceston
03:29 General Hospital and nothing happened, nothing changed. She said, "I was abused by this
03:35 man," but he stayed on for another, I think it was about nine years at the hospital.
03:41 Anyway, yesterday, after being gaslit for years, she opens this page and she just saw
03:46 everything laid out. She said it was one of the most validating experiences and so empowering.
03:52 We saw her tears. I think for a lot of people who will be going through this massive, massive
03:59 report, it's going to be hard. It's going to be a reckoning. It won't be everything
04:04 they wanted, but they say it's now up to the institutions and up to the government to take
04:11 it forward because it's no longer their fight to have.
04:14 [BLANK_AUDIO]