Seven years after the Commonwealth Royal Commission and two years after the Commission of Inquiry (CoI) into the Tasmanian Government’s Responses into Child Sexual Abuse in Institutional Settings, victim-survivors are seeing that we are losing ground on improvements to child safe guarding. A return to Business as Usual is seeing a return to Abuse as Usual in many institutional settings.

As ex-Tasmanian COI Commissioner, Leah Bromfield puts it,-“we are seeing a second wave of institutional betrayal”, nationally. Institutional reputations and concerns for the financial bottom line are driving high-level litigation to avoid accountability for catastrophic failings in child safe guarding over generations.

In my capacity as the Coordinator for LOUDfence Tasmania I am hearing of ongoing barriers to the reporting of child sexual abuse in Tasmania, with systems, policies and procedures that continue to favour CSA perpetrators over justice for victims.

Ongoing Government and institutional deference to demands for presumption of innocence, natural justice, procedural fairness, industrial protections, legal defences, and a standard of evidence beyond reasonable doubt easily outweighs the voice of a child subject to sexual abuse. Nothing has changed as a result of the Commission of Inquiry.

The Government promised that the interests and well-being of children would prevail over all other considerations, but there has been no practical expression of this when it comes to decision-making. To illustrate, Tasmania Police insists that multiple firsthand victims are needed before they will even entertain opening an investigation into any officer reported to be sexually abusing children by community leaders. This constitutes an insurmountable hurdle when one considers the personal risks of reporting on Police. This is exactly how Snr Sgt Reynolds was able to predate 52 known victims, while well known to be a paedophile in the community, as concluded by the Coroner at the inquest into his death. The uniform, the badge and the gun infer great power to Police, and it seems to suit their purposes to abuse this power to intimidate victims and the community more generally.

To date I have been told by a Tasmanian Senator, a MLC, an ex-MP, and a Mayor that Tasmanian Police are not to be trusted. What is the victim-survivor community meant to take away from this?

The concerns and interests of the adult world means that children are too often voiceless and helpless. To change this we need morally courageous political and institutional leadership.

Instead we find our leaders ‘surfing the second wave of institutional betrayal’.!