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In 2023, A Tasmanian inquiry uncovered decades of catastrophic failure to protect young people in the state’s care and a bureaucratic tangle that sheltered their abusers.

The Tasmanian government avoids accountability in many and varied ways. It constantly restructures departments without notice or explanation, and regularly shifts senior executives when the political heat rises.

It is easy to understand in this context why victim-survivors and their communities bear bone-weary cynicism and disillusionment about the possibility of real reform and redress. The whole system is rotten.

But the decades of cover-ups have also birthed an alternative economy of community explanations for the unexpurgated evil in their midst: a constant undercurrent of fearful whispers and factoids, often based on true reports that appear in the local papers one day but are gone the next, or episodes from the past that were never properly exposed.

A former police minister resigned in haste after being accused of child-sex offences; his son was later imprisoned over child-exploitation materials. A current government MP was a family friend of nurse James Griffin. The Launceston mayor had his working with children registration revoked. Two key witnesses to the commission of inquiry were viciously physically attacked after testifying, and others were threatened. The missing SERT documents, including CCTV footage and other evidence of crimes, were found in a department manager’s garage. A man who defamed now deputy premier Michael Ferguson – and was subsequently sent to prison for contempt – disappeared the day before the closing session of the commission; when he turned up again, he was taken to hospital, but no details were available. The government announced an independent review into allegations involving former police officer Paul Reynolds, but limited the terms of reference so it couldn’t compel evidence from other cops; nevertheless, there are likely to be hundreds of allegations against him. Several serious offenders from Ashley Youth Detention Centre – including alleged serial rapists – are still on the government payroll, and still working around children. There was another alleged paedophile nurse at Launceston hospital for two decades, and he’s now facing charges. It goes on and on.

While we saw pockets of good practice, this was often a result of the initiative and good judgment of individuals rather than something encouraged and enforced by a broader system. More commonly, institutions did not recognise child sexual abuse for what it was and failed to act decisively to manage risks and investigate complaints.

It only became obvious when the final report was released to the public, after the commission’s work was complete, that the government had rigged the game all along. The commission, despite its sterling work examining events across the state over 20 years, made only a single finding of misconduct. One.

The Department of Premier and Cabinet, when asked directly, is unable to cite a single instance since October 2020 in which an employee has been dismissed from the public service as a result of child sexual abuse or related cover-ups. More than 70 state servants have been suspended on full pay (pending departmental investigation) – for almost a year on average, and in some cases several years – as a result of allegations of child sexual abuse.

Five months after the end of the commission of inquiry, late last December, the police minister, Felix Ellis, reported to a parliamentary committee that of the 43 criminal referrals by the commission to Tasmania Police, just one remained under investigation. Only a single alleged perpetrator had been brought to court (and this case had already been under investigation prior to the commission’s referral). Every other case had already been dismissed.

Its governing legislation, parts of which were amended after the commission had been appointed, had prevented the commissioners from making the findings they wished to make. So the commissioners instead quietly seeded into their report’s footnotes references to those who had replied to their notification of a possible adverse finding – or one of misconduct – with a “Procedural Fairness Response”.

The list of individuals who provided such a response includes the solicitor-general, ombudsman, chief executive of the Integrity Commission, commissioner for children and young people, current and former managers of Ashley Youth Detention Centre, and current and former executives of the departments of communities, education and health. The list of entities that received notice of a possible adverse finding includes Tasmania Police, the departments of health and education, children and young people, the Teachers Registration Board, the Office of the Solicitor-General, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the State of Tasmania.

It is hard to conceive of a more devastating indictment of a government, or a more catastrophic, complete failure. There was complicity and negligence at every level, across departments and authorities. The victims are in the thousands, and their number is growing.

The responsibility for fixing these problems resides with the Tasmanian government. And if it’s unwilling – or incapable – of it? These are problems of national significance. They demand national attention.