Spotlight: Landmark Australian report delivers 400 recommendation to prevent institutional child abuse

By Matt Goss

CANBERRA, Dec. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse has delivered its final report with more than 400 recommendations.

After five years of work, the 17-volume report was handed to the Australian government on Friday along with the recommendations which commissioners said would prevent children from being subjected to such harm on a large scale ever again.

The report recommended that religious ministers who have reports of abuse confided in them during confession be forced to report it, a move that would represent a shake-up of a centuries-old tradition.

It also called for the Catholic Church to make celibacy voluntary for the clergy, saying having it be compulsory had contributed to decades of child abuse.

"There is no simple explanation for why child sexual abuse has occurred in a multitude of institutions," the report said.

"However, we have identified a number of ways in which institutions may, inadvertently or otherwise, enable or create opportunities for abuse."

Those ways include establishing a national strategy to prevent child sexual abuse and creating a ministerial portfolio with responsibility for children's policy issues.

Of the 6,875 abuse survivors who gave evidence to the commission in private sessions, 64.3 percent were male, the report said.

The greatest number of survivors and alleged perpetrators were within Catholic institutions with more than 60 percent of survivors saying they were abused by the church.

"We will never know the true number," the report said.

"Whatever the number, it is a national tragedy, perpetrated over generations within many of our most trusted institutions.

"Alleged perpetrators often continued to have access to children even when religious leaders knew they posed a danger."

Denis Hart, president of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, apologized unconditionally for the church's "shameful past."

"This is a shameful past, in which a prevailing culture of secrecy and self-protection led to unnecessary suffering for many victims and their families," Hart said.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Friday thanked those who had the courage to give evidence to the commission.

"It's been very tough, often harrowing work, but above all, I want to thank and honor the courage of the survivors and their families who've told, often for the first time, the dreadful stories of abuse that they received from people who actually owed them love and protection," Turnbull said.

Turnbull's sentiment was echoed by Julia Gillard, former prime minister who first announced the commission.

"On this historic day, my personal thanks go to the Royal Commissioners and all who supported their work," she said on social media.

"Our nation is indebted to you and to the survivors who fought so hard for justice and a safer future for our children."

Of the survivors who spoke to the commission, more than half said they were between the ages of 10 and 14 when they were first abused. On average female victims were younger when they were first abused than males.

They were abused for an average of 2.2 years.

More than 93 percent said their abuser was a male.

Two out of five survivors said they were abused while in out-of-home care while nearly a third were in school when they were victimized. More than 10 percent of survivors were in prison when they gave evidence.

Turnbull's government has already announced a remuneration scheme which would entitle victims of institutional abuse to as much as 115,000 U.S. dollars in compensation but every sate and territory must individually decide if it will sign up to the scheme. Enditem