Institutions who fail to join National Redress Scheme to be named and shamed

More than 20 institutions who have so far failed to sign up to the National Redress Scheme have been labelled “reprehensible” and warned that they risk their funding being pulled if they do not join the effort to help survivors of institutional child sex abuse.

The deadline to sign on to the scheme is Tuesday, June 30, and those institutions who fail to do so have been issued with a stark warning from the prime minister and Minister for Families and Social Services Anne Ruston, and face being publicly named and shamed on July 1.

“All institutions are doing in not joining is doubling down on the crime and doubling down on the hurt,” Morrison and Ruston said in a letter, seen by The New Daily. “We consider it to be reprehensible that you have failed to sign up to the scheme.”

The scheme was set up following the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, which heard evidence from more than 8,000 people in private sessions, as well as receiving more than 25,000 letters and over 42,000 calls. It aims to provide support to people who were sexually abused as children while in the care of an institution.

Minister for Families and Social Services Anne Ruston also previously called on any all institutions with a history of working with children to join the scheme in order to ensure that all survivors can access up to $150,000 in compensation, as well as an apology.

“As the deadline looms the time for institutions to act is now,” Ruston said in a statement earlier this month. “It is unacceptable that applications for redress remain on hold because survivors have named institutions that have not yet completed the necessary steps to join the Scheme. I have warned institutions that failure to fulfil their moral obligation to join the Scheme will have consequences including financial sanctions as well as being publicly named on 1 July.”

The Catholic Church became the first non-government organisation to sign up to the National Redress Scheme in May 2018, and has since been followed by many other national institutions, including the Anglican Church, Scouts, YMCA and Salvation Army.

The Catholic Church was previously estimated to be liable for around $1 billion in compensation, and Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher said the church expected to be paying out survivors for “many years to come”.

He told the ABC: “We’re going to back that with our insurance and our assets. We’re determined to bring justice and full redress – healing, if we can – to the victims of this terrible crime.”

So far, more than 200 non-government institutions have signed on to the National Redress Scheme. Of the groups yet to sign on, the majority are religious institutions such as Jehovah’s Witnesses – who are the only institution who have refused to join the scheme altogether – while others are secular organisations such as Swimming Australia and Football NSW.

According to multiple reports, around 100 victims are currently unable to access compensation via the scheme because the relevant organisation has not yet signed up.