Tuesday 20 May 2008

Child abuse compo must be fairer: lawyer


A lawyer says SA needs a fairer scheme to compensate abused former state wards

The lawyer for alleged victims of child abuse has written to the South Australian Premier urging that a fairer compensation scheme be set up.

Peter Humphries says his law firm is representing about 150 people who were former wards of the state.

He says the SA Government's current compensation scheme can result in discrepancies in payouts between victims of similar types of abuse.

Mr Humphries says pursuing compensation through the courts can be also be stressful for victims and he favours a statutory scheme.

"My guess is that even those who might have a reasonably good case to take to court would probably opt to get involved in some statutory scheme as I say if that was reasonably fair," he said.

The recent Mullighan inquiry investigated cases of abuse among former state wards and made a range of recommendations to the SA Government.

Related:

Compensation for SA sex abuse victims
The South Australian Government says it will focus on compensation for victims, now that the inquiry into the sexual abuse of children in state care is complete.

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