NATIONAL REDRESS SCHEME
890. Mr P.J. RUNDLE to the Attorney General:
I
refer to concerns voiced by victims of child sex abuse that their compensation
applications through the National Redress Scheme are taking too long to
process, six years after the royal commission began and 18 months after our
statute of limitations legislation passed.
(1) Can the
Attorney General promise Western Australian survivors they will get their
compensation applications processed and paid in a timely fashion rather than
being forced to wait while they and their families navigate this difficult time
in their lives?
(2) Will the
Attorney General turn his focus towards working with relevant authorities in
expediting the compensation process?
(3) Is the
Attorney General making survivors wait until the commercialisation of the
Landgate deal has settled before they can access much-deserved compensation?
Mr J.R.
QUIGLEY replied:
(1)–(3) I
heard the federal Liberal minister apologising to the public this morning on
radio. A survivor of sexual abuse had rung in to say that it had been 14 months
since she had put in her application to the federal government's
National Redress Scheme and she had not seen anything. Mrs Ruston, I think it
is, said —
Ms S.F. McGurk:
Senator Ruston.
Mr J.R. QUIGLEY: She was
saying how appalled she was that her system is not working properly. This is a National
Redress Scheme that Western Australia signed up to. Upon invitation by the
commonwealth, Western Australia was able to nominate assessors, which we did,
to assess these claims. I heard the federal Liberal minister today say that she
never envisaged how complicated the process of assessing would be. The federal
minister said on radio, ''I'll have to take this on notice. I don't
know what's going on, but if you give me a couple of days, I promise
you I will get back to you.'' She asked this survivor of child sexual
abuse to leave her number with the producer and she would get back to her in
two days. We would like to see all Western Australians compensated in a timely
manner. That is why, of course, the Western Australian Labor government, in an
early iteration, introduced two redress schemes—the country hostels
redress scheme and another child abuse redress scheme. All those people got their money in a timely manner. It was up to
$90 000 until, alas, that election of 2008 when Premier Barnett came in
and slashed the compensation in half, right down to $45 000, and then slackened
off on the time for payment. We want the Western Australian Liberal Party and
the Western Australian National Party to get onto the federal government to
demand fair and just compensation in a timely manner for all Western Australians.