PACK RAPE LEADS TO DENIAL CULTURE
14.12.2007
EDITORIAL.
LIKE a house of cards, the claims by state and territory governments that they are serious in their efforts to tackle the problems of child abuse in remote indigenous communities have begun to tumble. The scandal surrounding the pack rape of a 10-year-old girl at Aurukun and the lenient treatment given to her attackers has shocked people around the world. Today's revelation by Tony Koch of an official cover-up strikes at the heart of the Queensland Government's credibility on the issue. The Northern Territory Government's justification for maintaining the permit system that restricts access to indigenous lands -- that NT police want it -- has been exposed as untrue. In Western Australian, the prosecution of five boys, aged 11 and 14, charged with sexually penetrating and indecently dealing with two boys, aged six and seven, at Kalumburu in the north of the state has been dropped because the victims cannot give credible evidence.
As federal Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin begins her consultations on the Howard government's controversial NT intervention, the evidence in favour of its being expanded is more pressing than ever. Queensland Premier Anna Bligh has even asked that Aboriginal affairs be added to the already crowded list of topics for discussion at next week's first COAG meeting called by Kevin Rudd. The Australian has always supported the extension of the NT intervention of welfare supervision and alcohol bans to help improve the living conditions of indigenous children. But it must be backed up with resources, both human and infrastructure.
Recent events demonstrate there is a desperate need for a complete rethink of misguided welfare policies that are doing more harm than good. We share the concerns of Aboriginal leader Noel Pearson that many welfare workers believe the notion that indigenous children being taken into care and placed with non-indigenous foster carers is ``another stolen generation''. We are not at all surprised that the foster carer who was forced to surrender a 10-year-old girl, who was later pack raped when left unsupervised at her indigenous community, said he found white bureaucrats to be the most dogmatic. Such dogmatic thinking ultimately underpins today's shocking revelations by Koch, that political interference stopped a wide-scale police investigation into indigenous child sex abuse on Cape York. The allegation, made by a police officer in an official interview, puts the lie to claims by Queensland Police Minister Judy Spence that there is no need for a special police investigation to crack down on child sex abuse on the Cape. It is much easier to believe Mr Pearson that the repeated rape of a 10-year-old girl at Aurukun is the ``tip of the iceberg''. Nine men and boys pleaded guilty to raping the young girl but none was sent to prison by Queensland District Court judge Sarah Bradley. The case, exposed by The Australian on Monday, raises serious questions about the administration of justice in indigenous communities in north Queensland.
Ms Bligh clearly agrees there is no room for different treatment of indigenous and non-indigenous offenders under the law. Lenient treatment sends the wrong message that sexual assault of children is taken less seriously in indigenous communities, encouraging more abuse. Mr Pearson is right that the only way to re-establish order and functionality in Aboriginal society is to become intolerant of abuse. Mr Pearson is right that the child-rape victim at Aurukun is really a victim of a history of judicial leniency that goes back decades and was wrong-headed about culpability and appropriate child-protection practices.
Ms Bligh has responded to publicity about the case by calling for an appeal and a review of all sentences for sex assault on Cape York. But, as The Australian reports today, the Aurukun pack rape has exposed a culture of denial and cover-up that potentially runs to the heart of Ms Bligh's Government. A full investigation must be called into claims that political interference stopped a wide-scale police investigation into child sex abuse on Cape York. Koch has exposed that reports of child sex abuse made to child-protection officers by frontline health workers were routinely not passed on to police for investigation. When a system was established by police to track down cases that had not been forwarded, ``it got to a political level'' and ``ministers got involved and certain people were told not to speak to the police''.
The claim was made by Detective Sergeant Dave Harold of the Child Protection Investigation Unit at Cairns in evidence to Queensland's Crime and Misconduct Commission. The CMC was investigating the actions of child-protection workers who failed the 10-year-old girl, who contracted venereal diseases after she was raped.
Sergeant Harold's interview paints a picture of a complete system failure when dealing with child welfare in Queensland's indigenous communities. Case workers routinely lied to police. Children were taken from the safety of foster care and returned to communities where they were at immediate risk of assault. Child-protection officers failed in their basic duty of care to vulnerable children. Medical workers who saw first-hand evidence of child abuse were left frustrated and their warnings ignored. Sergeant Harold's claim that the cover-up by welfare workers was done under instructions from their political masters cannot go untested. It points to a culture in which public officials were more interested in protecting their own skin than acting to stop the suffering of children that they knew was taking place. If true, it is further evidence that the states deserve to have matters taken out of their hands.
