All Victorian children deserve to be safe. When community and church leaders misuse their positions of power and abuse vulnerable children, the law must be sufficiently capable of holding them to account.

Last year, the High Court of Australia heard a case brought by a victim-survivor who had been abused in Apollo Bay by a now deceased Catholic Priest, Father Bryan Coffey. It found, due to a legal loophole, that the Catholic Diocese was not responsible for the Priest’s crimes. As a result, the victim-survivor went through a harrowing and drawn-out legal ordeal and lost their case.

The Court ruled that Catholic Priests are not technically ‘employed’ by the Diocese, meaning the Diocese could not be held vicariously liable for the actions of its priests. This ruling is inconsistent with the decisions from other Common Law countries internationally.

This is wrong and this is unfair.

All employers across Victoria should be held to a consistent standard, yet the Catholic Church has been able to use a legal loophole to convince Australia’s highest Court it should have a special status that allows them to evade their obligations to children.

Continuing and building on Victoria’s legacy as the first state in Australia to introduce reforms in this area of institutional child abuse, urgent action needs to be taken.

Victoria, once again, has an opportunity — and a responsibility — to lead with compassion and justice, ensuring survivors of institutional child abuse are not now abandoned by force of this High Court ruling.

They have already been abandoned by the institutions.

Victoria must lead the way once again and close this loophole.

Today, 14 organisations and individuals met with the Victorian Government MPs to call on them to urgently introduce legislation to right this wrong. We are victim-survivors of child abuse, legal experts, child protection organisations and advocates, and Victorian trade unions, and we are all calling for urgent change.  

Laws must be introduced to hold organisations to account for acts of child abuse. Victim-survivors need avenues for recourse. Individuals who carry out activities as part of or for the benefit of an institution/organisation must be deemed to be ‘akin to an employee’, which will mean organisatons will be held vicariously liable for these heinous crimes.

These laws must be retrospective. And the laws must be introduced urgently to provide some certainty for vulnerable victim-survivors.

Quotes Attributable to Luke Hilakari, VTHC Secretary

This is an employment issue. The Catholic Church is using a legal loophole which enables them as employers to be held to a different standard than other employers. They are using this loophole to not compensate victims for appalling acts of abuse of children. Victorian unions will not stand for industrial principles like vicarious liability being used in this way.

Victoria has led the way on so many important reforms. We have an opportunity here to seek justice for those whose faith and trust was fundamentally destroyed.

Quotes Attributable to Judy Courtin, lawyer

Once again, the Catholic Church is getting away with it. In its eyes, the church has been granted judicial approval to avoid its legal and moral obligations to right the odious wrongs of its criminal past.

As the law currently stands, we have two classes of victim/survivors. Those who have access to justice and those who don’t.

Urgent action is needed. The Catholic Church has found another way to abuse survivors. It no longer pretends the molestation didn’t happen, just that it’s not their problem it did.

Quotes Attributable to Chrisse Foster AM

To date not one member of the Catholic hierarchy, worldwide, has been held to account for the hierarchy’s criminal cover up of clergy sex crimes against children that the hierarchy orchestrated which ultimately created more victims.

In August 2018, two weeks after becoming Australia’s Prime Minister, Scott Morrison announced he would give an extra $4.1 billion payment to Catholic Education over a 10-year period – enough to pay every cent of compensation they pay their victims and every cent they pay their defence lawyers.

The champagne corks must still be popping in Bishops’ and Archbishops’ Palaces around Australia celebrating the High Court decision last year, allowing them to not compensate about one third of their victims.

Don’t let them win again.