Tears have taken up residence behind Grant West’s bright blue eyes.
He is 57 years old, a burly Kiwi living in Australia with bleach-tipped hair and a crumpled leather jacket.
By his estimate, he was sexually abused by 60 to 80 men by the time he turned 18. Just two of them faced justice.
His first abuser was his mother, he says. He was 4.
Published in Stuff
The government has announced it is boosting the funding of more than 20 existing underfunded mental health services.
It is also allocating $30 million for the creation of new front-line services that will start operating early next year.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Minister of Health David Clark made the announcement in Auckland this morning.
Published in Radio New Zealand
The Catholic Church has accepted legal responsibility for the sexual abuse of a nine-year-old boy by notorious paedophile Gerald Ridsdale in a significant case which could open the floodgates for victims seeking compensation.
After denying any knowledge of Ridsdale’s offending before the boy was raped in a confessional box at Mortlake in 1982, lawyers for the church on Friday accepted an amended statement of claim from the victim in the Supreme Court – in effect admitting legal liability for his crimes.
Published in The Age
Research funded jointly by social service providers and philanthropic organisations. Published from Women’s Health, Volume 15: 1–17, 2019.
The government is underfunding social service providers delivering services that are essential to the wellbeing of New Zealand children, families, whānau and communities by an estimated $630 million a year, an independent study has found.
The study found that the government funds social service providers for less than two thirds of the actual costs of delivering the essential services they are contracted to provide, often for some of New Zealand’s most vulnerable people.
Download the Press Release (PDF)
By Social Services Providers Aotearoa
2 September 2019
Prestige lecture: Prof. Tess Patterson
Watch on YouTube
By Prof Ian Rothmann
26 August 2019
Warning: This story deals with the topic of suicide.
Health authorities are being urged to target a growing number of young men dying by suicide.
Figures released on Monday show 112 of the 685 people to die by suicide in the year to June 2019 were men aged 15 to 24.
More than three in every 10,000 young men aged 20 to 24 died by suicide, and men of all age groups made up 68 per cent of suicides.
Victoria University lecturer Dr Chris Bowden said the high rate was due to the “invisibility of men in previous suicide prevention”.
Published in Stuff
Warning: This story deals with the topic of suicide.
The number of suicides in New Zealand has reached its highest-ever level, with 685 people dying in the year to June 30.
That compares to the 2018 road toll where 377 lives were lost.
Published in Stuff
The Labor senator Kristina Keneally has blasted Melbourne’s Catholic archbishop for his response to Cardinal George Pell losing his appeal against child sexual abuse convictions.
Keneally, herself a prominent Catholic, said she was gobsmacked that Archbishop Peter Comensoli had maintained that Pell was innocent and had questioned whether his victim was mistaken. “It’s distressing for so many reasons,” she told Sky News on Sunday.
Published in The Guardian
On Wednesday, Cardinal George Pell lost his appeal to overturn a conviction of child sexual assault.
Chief Justice Anne Ferguson, Justice Chris Maxwell and Justice Mark Weinberg of the Victorian supreme court published their reasons in a 323-page judgment, along with a seven-page summary.
Ferguson and Maxwell found that the jury’s initial verdict was not unreasonable, while Weinberg, in dissent, said it should be overturned. Below are the excerpts that best summarise why and how that judgment was reached.
Published in The Guardian
In response to concerns expressed within our survivor community, and to foster a more informed understanding of male circumcision as it presents in our contemporary society, MSA commissioned the attached literature review titled “Circumcision: A controversial topic.”
This paper also references another discussion on the ethical considerations of circumcision titled “Genital Autonomy and Sexual Wellbeing”, which has been included in our web Research archive to further inform our readers.
There’s hope the government’s Criminal Justice Summit will be more than just talk.
The two-day conference kicked off last night, and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern called on all those present to share their experiences and ideas over the coming days.
Published in Radio New Zealand
A study examining the importance of preserving the values and ethos of user-led peer support and self-help in the context of new policies to professionalise peer support.
There is a renewed acknowledgement of the role of peer support in mental health with new government policies calling for the appointment of peer support workers within mental health services. While this is a welcome move, there is also a danger that the values and ethos of peer support, based as it is in self-determination, reciprocity, empathy and shared experience, might be lost given its professionalisation, especially in the context of decreasing resources within the NHS. The report ‘The Freedom to be, the Chance to Dream: Preserving User-led Peer Support in Mental Health’, commissioned by the mental health charity Together and written by Alison Faulkner and Jayasree Kalathil, is based on a consultation with mental health service users and peer support services and their views on these new developments.
Published in Survivor Research
2012
The first Procedural hearing of the Abuse in Care Inquiry is on Monday, 19 August at 10am at Rydges Hotel, Federal Street in Auckland.
Published in Abuse in State Care Royal Commission of Inquiry
Boys’ experience of abuse may be construed as consensual or desired. They often aren’t even thought of as potential victims. This has to change
Published in The Independent
A 52-year-old man charged with the rape of young girls and making recordings now faces seven additional charges as a police investigation continues.
Equestrian Andrew Alan Williams was arrested in May along with his partner Laken Maree Rose, 29, and was charged with indecent assault and unlawful sexual connection with a child.
Williams appeared in Tauranga District Court on August 8 and has been charged with seven additional charges relating to two new, alleged victims. One is a three-year-old.
Published in Stuff