LAKE ALICE IN THE MEDIA

On 18 December 2024, the Government made an announcement in relation to redress for survivors who were at the Lake Alice Adolescent Unit.

Unfortunately, the Government’s announcements concern only survivors of abuse at the Child and Adolescent Unit at Lake Alice between 1972-1977. The Government’s comments about improvements to redress for survivors who suffered abuse at other psychiatric hospitals or in the care of the State as a child have been vague and non-committal.

There is not yet a process for revisiting the adequacy of the redress payment survivors received from other government agencies despite many suffering very similar abuse to those at the Child and Adolescent Unit at Lake Alice between 1972-1977, which has resulted in significantly higher redress payments than many survivors received.

The reason this payment is only available to survivors of abuse at the Child and Adolescent Unit at Lake Alice between 1972-1977 is because that is the only institution and timeframe for which the Government has acknowledged that torture occurred, which it was forced to do following a United Nations decision. We are working on ways to force the Government to acknowledge that torture occurred in many more care scenarios, but that will take time. We also expect some criticism of the slow pace of redress for survivors who suffered abuse in care in contexts other than the Child and Adolescent Unit at Lake Alice will feature in the media following the announcements.

We hope this information is useful despite not providing any timeframes, which will ultimately be determined by the Government.

In saying that, we are expecting to hear more from the Government about a new redress scheme by mid-2025, however it is unlikely that the new scheme will meet the recommendations of the Royal Commission in full, including the recommendations about redress payments being significantly higher than at present.