The Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care has recommended the government appoints and funds an independent advisory group to investigate potential unmarked graves and urupa at the sites of former psychiatric and psychopaedic hospitals, social welfare institutions, or other relevant sites.

It was revealed many patients who died in psychiatric and social welfare institutions between the 1800s and 1990s were given "pauper's graves". Read more

After nearly three years of behind-the-scenes legal wrangling to avoid scrutiny from the Inquiry, the church applied for a judicial review in June.

At a hearing, held earlier this month it argued it was beyond the inquiry's scope because it did not operate institutions that cared for children or vulnerable people and the inquiry had uncovered no evidence of abuse in that context.

Lawyers representing the Inquiry argued that Jehovah's Witness elders - equivalent to ministers or pastors - exercised a level of control over the congregation that allowed them access to children. Read more

The Royal Commission is extending its Anglican enquiry investigation and will now be known as the Protestant and Other Faiths Investigation.

As well as adding the Presbyterian and Methodist and the Salvation Army churches, the Gloriavale, the Exclusive Brethren and Jehovah's Witness communities are now included.

The Anglican, Methodist, Presbyterian and Salvation Army faiths engaged in care provision throughout the Royal Commission's 1950-1999 period of inquiry.

The Commission will consider evidence of abuse, which includes physical, sexual, emotional or psychological abuse and neglect.

It will also consider the impacts of such abuse and any structural, systemic or practical factors which contributed to abuse, and consider domestic and international law including human rights law.

There won't be public hearings, but findings of the expanded investigation will be released before June next year.

A spokesperson for the Commission said expanding the investigation recognises the large numbers of people from each organisation willing to pass on information.

"The scope is being formally extended to recognise increased numbers of survivors from these faiths and their institutions - including schools and care homes - who have disclosed abuse to the Royal Commission."

Expansion opens door to some uncertainty

The expansion of the Royal Commission's interest raises the level of uncertainty around Auckland's Dilworth School.

To date the school has supported old boy survivors wanting to contact the Police or Royal Commission regarding experiences from their time at the school.

Media reports say the school has engaged leading human rights lawyer Frances Joychild QC to lead an independent Inquiry into Historical Abuse at the "associated Anglican school," however in a statement to CathNews, the school clarifies that "Ms Joychild QC was recommended to Dilworth School by the Dilworth Class Action Group.

"No appointment has yet been made to head the Independent Inquiry."

The school however remains committed to an independent inquiry.

"The Dilworth Trust Board remains committed to launching an Independent Inquiry into historical abuse at the School, as well as a Redress Programme for Old Boy survivors. We continue to work towards launching both programmes in the coming months," says Dilworth Trust Board Chairman, Aaron Snodgrass.

The school's Junior Campus New Boy Handbook 2019 says it is "the founder's will requires the Dilworth Trustees to give the beneficiaries of the Trust a Christian education based on the tenets of the Anglican Church."

It says all its students receive religious education, baptism preparation and confirmation courses.

A second instance of uncertainty concerns the 'missing' report from Otago Daily Times reporter Chris Morris.

In 2020, ODT newsroom sources told Stuff that Morris was working on a story involving allegations centred around a Dunedin high school, that the story was laid out for printing but was pulled at the last minute.

Morris' Twitter account continues to have his 2020 resignation tweet pinned to the top of his Twitter page.

"Today, after six months bashing my head against a brick wall, trying without success to get a worthy story published, I quit my job at @odtnews in protest. To say I'm gutted would be an understatement, but I feel the need to stand up for some basic journalistic principles."

How to contact the Commission

The Commission is encouraging any other survivors who have not already spoken to them to get in touch.

"We continue to ask survivors to come forward. Further evidence gathered will add to our existing evidence base and understanding of abuse in these faiths, and findings about them will be included in the Royal Commission's Interim Faith report."

"Survivors who want to share experiences about abuse by any of these faiths are encouraged to call us confidentially on 0800 222 727 or register on our website and we will phone you."

Source

• RNZ
• NZ Herald
• Newshub
• NZ Herald
• Stuff
• Dilworth School
• Dilworth Response
• Anglican Church of Aotearoa New Zealand
• Chris Morris
• Abuse in Care Royal Commission

CathNews is primarily an aggregation service; it relies on public media sources. Sections of this article have been amended in line with information provided directly by Dilworth School.

More than 30 witnesses gave evidence to the Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care - many survivors, some experts and some senior members of the Catholic Church.

In her closing statement, lawyer Sally McKechnie, who represented New Zealand's Catholic bishops and leaders at the hearing, repeated their apologies for what happened at the school.

"This harm should never have happened and it is a great shame and deep regret to the Church that it has".

She went on to acknowledge the courage of survivors who had shared their experiences with the inquiry.

"The brothers and the Church have heard their pain, and they have heard the anger, and frustrations.

"That Marylands was a place of sexual, physical and psychological abuse was horrific and the Church apologises to you, survivors, to your families, whanau and to the hundreds of co-workers who worked in these institutions".

The Church does not want to question the evidence of survivors, McKechnie stressed.

Rather, it wants to "learn how the church can ensure that proper redress and healing takes place for survivors of abuse".

Doing so, however, won't be without challenges, she said.

The fact some survivors want a close and supportive relationship with the church while others do not want any at all makes it 'very challenging' to implement a fair and effective model of redress, she said.

McKechnie said a further challenge was to determine how to provide effective financial redress, as some survivors said they had little if any of the money they received as redress payment left.

Payments had to be delivered in a way that gave survivors the freedom to choose how they wanted to spend the money, while balancing that with the need to provide them long-term support, she explained.

While the Church has since implemented additional processes around abuse and safeguarding, 'there is clearly still work to do' she said.

Earliler, Catholic Archbishop Paul Martin offered a heartfelt apology to the Commission earlier last week in his role as the current Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Christchurch.

"I want to apologise and I want to convey the deep sadness that I feel and I know our Catholic people do as well, because this was an institution that was supported by the community - and to know what we thought we were supporting was not actually doing what it should have been doing," he said.

"It is a cause of deep shame and sorrow".

Martin said the Church wanted to be better.

"We don't have these institutions anymore. We do take it very seriously and do want to try to be better now and into the future".

Martin, the current Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Christchurch, accepts that survivors want the church to take responsibility for historical abuse cases and not just leave it to the particular order involved.

Source

• Stuff
• NZHerald
• Image: NZHerald

Mount told the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State Care and in the Care of Faith-based Institutions last week that change was needed.

The commission was in its second and final week of hearings into redress for people in state care between 1950 and 1999.

Its next public hearings start later this month when the focus will be on redress for faith-based abuse claimants.

A number of victims over the last year have told the Commission during private and at public hearings they are being re-traumatised when cases get to court.

They want a fairer and more just system.

Mount, who is the counsel assisting the commission asked Solicitor-General Una Jagose whether a different system could be modelled on Waitangi Tribunal. The Tribunal is an independent body, which focuses specifically on treaty claims.

Nothing like that exists for settling historical abuse claims.

A critical feature of the tribunal's success is its independence, Mount told Jagose.

While Jagose agreed independence is a feature, she said there were other aspects that also helped.

It has a different mode of operating, and among the many things that go into the mix of the tribunal's successes, is that it's
"much more inclined towards restoration of mana," she said.

The commission also heard about other successful ways to settle claims that do not involve going to court. Dispute resolution tribunals were offered a an example.

Jagose was asked why abuse claims procedures had not been changed to follow different models.

"There will be reasons to do with it not having priority in government that survivors would say it should have had. That those voices [were] not being heard sufficiently by those who get to make the choice to do something different," it was suggested.

Jagose said the Law Commission was probably best suited to investigate alternatives to court action to resolve abuse claims.

Source

• RNZ
• Image: New Zealand Family Violence Clearinghouse