Chris Hayes (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

This morning I had the opportunity to speak on the Crimes Amendment (Working With Children—Criminal History) Bill 2009. I preface my contribution to the debate on this motion by saying one of the things that I think unites most people generally, certainly everyone I know this place, is the fact that we put children in the forefront of our thinking. I am very fortunate to have three fine kids, and those who have ever heard me talk will know how proud I am of my four grandchildren. I cannot for the life of me think that anyone could not act to put kids in the forefront of their thinking. Therefore, it behoves governments that we do everything in our power to protect children. I take up the point just made by the member for Murray: these are things that should be at the forefront of government because children are our future.

I would like to take the opportunity today to reiterate the words of the Prime Minister and other members of this parliament from all sides of politics who have acknowledged the appalling abuse and cruelty towards those of the forgotten Australians and former child migrants who suffered whilst brought up as state wards in institutions—and who were brought up unloved. The apology to the forgotten Australians, like the apology made to the Indigenous Australians, is an apology that is very important. It is not about furthering a political agenda but rather doing what is right and what is decent.

We all know that this apology to the forgotten Australians and child migrants is a historic moment in their lives and, more importantly, is the first step to moving forward. It is the opportunity to formally recognise past injustices and to recognise that what happened was not their fault but the failure of the system. I know that this apology to the forgotten Australians and former child migrants will bring special meaning to people involved and their families. Hopefully, it will provide a measure of closure for them.

I pay particular tribute to one person, John Hennessey, who lives in Ingleburn—not far from my electorate office. John was born in Bristol in the UK. His mother was an unmarried 16-year-old who was encouraged to give her baby up at birth. At some stage, John, after having been in an orphanage run by a particular religious order, was shipped off to Australia along with about another 10,000 boys and girls. Clearly, British orphanages were overflowing and John, as I say, was transported to Australia. He went to Western Australia and spent his time, I think, at a BoysTown. John is 73 and is a very iconic figure in my electorate. He has been around for some considerable time. He has undertaken various roles in our community, including that of deputy mayor. But he is a 73-year-old and he speaks with an unmistakable stutter. He told me that he started stuttering at age 12. Most stutterers are kids. We went through this not that long ago when my three-year-old granddaughter started stuttering. What did we do? We went and took advice. We went and saw paediatricians. We did everything we could to address it. As I understand the advice, stuttering is normally acquired at preschool age and, provided it is approached carefully and consistently, can be ameliorated. Fortunately, that is the experience that we found with my three-year-old granddaughter.

John told me that he started stuttering at age 12. Ordinarily, I would have thought that was a bit unusual, but his life was unusual. I understand that when he was 12 John was stripped naked in front of 50 other boys and thrashed within an inch of his life at this orphanage near Perth for stealing grapes from a nearby vineyard. His point to me was that as a result of this incident he started stuttering. But the routine beatings were only one terrifying aspect of John’s life in this grim institution. He recounted to me that he faced perpetual hunger and heavy labour. But, more horrifically, and with a fair degree of certainty from his perspective, in the night whilst he was in his dormitory he would be violated sexually.

Despite this young kid being uprooted from his country of origin and suffering these mental and physical scars, John went on to represent his community with distinction. In the 1980s, over his period of time on the council, he was elected Deputy Mayor of the Campbelltown City Council and has made an invaluable contribution to our local area. Given the horrific nature of John’s life, one could be excused for thinking, ‘How could that come about?’ After reading and listening to some of the heartbreaking stories of the forgotten Australians and former child migrants like John, one can only start to imagine how much they have suffered and continue to suffer.

John says to me: ‘That pain is something that you carry on. It was bad enough that we went through all that as a child—to be cut off from any relatives, to go through not knowing anything about your parent or parents and to be told that your mother died.’ He said that is something he struggles with. In fact, when I was talking to him just recently as he was preparing to come down to Canberra to personally witness the apology, John revealed to me that it would have been great for his mother to see this day. His mother died without him ever seeing her or being able to visit her. He thought this apology should also have been delivered to her and many other young mothers in a similar predicament who gave up their children to an orphanage to try to secure a better life than they could have provided for the child. John has been invited to travel to England next year to hear the apology as it is delivered by the British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, because this is not something that just involves Australians. This involves the policies of other countries—Malta and Great Britain—in terms of how these young people were treated.

However long it has taken for this apology, we know we cannot give back what was lost to people like John, the 500,000 other forgotten Australians and the 7,000 former child migrants. It is not the words of the apology that are important but the genuine feeling of sorrow, remorse and regret for the actions taken by past administrations and also the lasting hurt that the forgotten Australians and former child migrants have had to endure ever since. These are the people in our society that have been stripped of their childhood and of all those things that you, I and every other member here take for granted in respect of our kids and our grandkids. This is something that these people could never personally experience themselves. They were deprived of that experience. I know we cannot take away the pain, but this apology is aimed at addressing our past wrongs.

Finally I would like to pay tribute to the tireless work of the various groups representing the forgotten Australians and the many years that it has taken to bring this to reality. Through their persistence, I think they have done the community a great service by making sure that the facts of these issues are at the forefront of our minds. To the hundreds of people who gathered in the Great Hall to join with the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, it is a very significant turning point in our national history, not simply to say sorry but to commit ourselves to take action for the future.

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