It should be noted that The Newcastle Herald ("Claimed knowledge about pedophile priest") reported on 19 May 2010, a month before Brian Lucas gave evidence, that in October 1995 the church sought to secretly defrock a priest. It therefore conceded he was guilty of offences against children, but waited until 2005 before contacting police about the allegations about the priest "shortly before the priest died."
The Senate committee's report concluded that Australia should have a Charities Commission and that a new public benefit test should be introduced.
It is anybody's guess whether this will happen. But it needs to happen.
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Furthermore, I suggest, amendments to the crime of "accessory after the fact", or the like, to bring offenders who knowingly move abusers sideways to protect them and their institutions, should indeed be "drawn more precisely". The price of not doing so is the continuing sexual and other abuses of children and others.
If there cannot be support for such amendments across party lines, it means Australia is truly under the thumb of churches and others with vested interests, and politicians' feigned concern for the welfare of children will continue to be a gross abuse of human rights.
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