Australia Offers Rare National Apology to Victims of Child Sex Abuse

Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Leader of the Opposition Bill Shorten at the National Apology to survivors of child sexual abuse in the Great Hall at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on October 22, 2018. Mick Tsikas/AAP/Reuters

SYDNEY—Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Oct. 22, offered a rare national apology, only the second since 2008, to victims of institutional child sexual abuse and their families, bringing some survivors to tears.

The gesture followed a five-year inquiry into child sexual abuse that delved into more than 8,000 cases of sexual misconduct, most of them at religious and state-run institutions responsible for keeping children safe.

“Today, as a nation, we confront our failure to listen, to believe, and to provide justice,” Morrison told lawmakers in the Australian capital, Canberra.

Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison stands before delivering the National Apology to survivors of child sexual abuse in the House of Representatives at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on Oct. 22, 2018. Mick Tsikas/AAP/Reuters

“We say sorry. To the children we failed, sorry. To the parents whose trust was betrayed and who have struggled to pick up the pieces, sorry.”

Expressions of national regret such as Monday’s are reserved for egregious misdeeds in which the state has played a role.

In the previous instance in 2008, then prime minister Kevin Rudd apologized to members of the Stolen Generations of indigenous Australians, forcibly taken from their families and communities as young children under assimilation policies.

Morrison also repeated Monday’s apology in a speech to nearly 800 victims, some of whom began to cry, images broadcast on television showed.

A woman reacts as she watches Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison deliver the National Apology to victims and survivors of Institutional Child Sexual Abuse outside Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on Oct. 22, 2018. Lukas Coch/AAP/Reuters

“It was very, very intense to be in that room,” Graeme, a victim who identified himself only by his first name, told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.

“I looked around and I thought to myself there is not a room of stronger people anywhere in the country.”

He added, “I am proud to be a victim and I am proud of all victims.”

Morrison vowed tougher oversight, although some victims say the government has failed to do enough.

“If they think saying sorry is going to finish it, it’s not,” Tony Wardley, who suffered abuse in the 1980s, told the broadcaster. “There’s still so much to be done.”

Australia set up a redressal scheme this year to pay abuse victims compensation of up to A$150,000 ($106,000) each.

But the conservative government has yet to decide if it will adopt recommendations from the wide-ranging national inquiry, most notably one requiring Catholic priests to report child abuse they may learn about in the confessional.

In August, a top Catholic body, the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference, said it would not comply with proposed state laws.

By Colin Packham