When: Tonight
Time: 7pm
Where: New Norfolk Library
Cassie O’Conner
At today’s meeting with Cassie O’Conner I was able to ask the question, as the Minister for Human Services, when are you envisaging an apology to the people who lived at Willow Court and Royal Derwent Hospital?
The answer in short “is late next year is the plan”, the long answer is “that there needs to be a lot of support from People living with Disabilities and those that advocate on behalf of those people whom may not be able to advocate for themselves.”
Silence on this matter will not give support, even though there is an evidence basis for an apology. It is also important that this is not seen as an apology on behalf of previous Staff of Willow Court, but more an apology for the past policies and practices.
Site of Conscience call for notorious Parramatta Girls Home
Click here to see full article. Call for “Site of Conscience”
There has been a call for Parramatta Girls home to be declared a “Site of Conscience” with the International Coalition of Sites of Conscience, the same group that we are advocating for Willow Court.
“Authorities promised to educate and reform “uncontrollable” young women but molestation, punishments and humiliation occurred, mirroring the thousands of cases of child abuse in institutional care that were recognised in the federal government’s 2009 Apology to the Forgotten Australians.”
“The redevelopment of the site needs to respect past occupants, recognise sufferings and wrongs and not be driven by commercial interests,” a 1970 inmate of Parramatta Girls Home and founder of Parragirls, Bonney Djuric, said. “The site can have interpretation centres, research facilities, art studios and memorial gardens.”
This call sounds familiar?