David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I hate to disabuse the senator, but this isn't about the senator. These issues in the scheme have been known for years and years, including when the senator was minister. What did the coalition government do? Absolutely nothing. I'm not going to be lectured on standing up for victims of child sexual abuse by a minister who sat for years in this portfolio and saw this injustice playing out and did nothing about it. And now that finally the Labor government, to their credit, are removing this injustice after years and years of the former coalition government just accepting it as the price of doing business to protect these institutions, I'm not going to stand here and be lectured to by a minister who did nothing on this issue.

I'll tell you who I credit for this parliament and the former government finally acting. I credit the brave survivors and the victims who came and told their truth to the royal commission. I credit the royal commission, which had a trauma-informed response, allowed that truth to be told to the nation and gave those institutions every skerrick of natural justice, and in doing that exposed them for what they were: bullies, deniers—institutions that were putting their assets and their wealth before the interests of victims and survivors. I credit the victims and survivors who finally got us to this point, not politicians in this place.

When we are debating this, it's not about what Minister X said or Minister Y said; it's about the truth on the ground to victims and survivors. And the truth on the ground to victims and survivors right now is that hundreds and thousands of victims and survivors—the most vulnerable cohort whose life has spun out of control and who find themselves in the criminal justice system—are being denied access to even a modest amount of compensation because of actions like the coalition's where they continue to put institutions ahead of those survivors. So, I'm not going to be lectured by some minister who did nothing on this for years. I'm going to listen to survivors and victims, and the Greens are going to listen to survivors and victims.

I'll say this: the government listened to survivors and victims, the review and the family, and they're responding with decency. What's not decent is the Dutton-esque attack using law-and-order politics against the government because they're actually being decent. That's what's offensive in this debate.