To park at a shopping centre car park can incur a fine of of $112 for not being fully within the lines of the parking space. The ticket is not enveloped. It is a white piece of paper about 3cm by 15cm. This is not easily noticed  or could be mistaken for something else such as advertising material. In my case, the ticket was on the passenger side of the screen and not noticed until the next day. 

Friday’s Liberal Party mess brings to mind the declarations of Malcolm Turnbull prior to his foray into politics. He was for a republic and a strong supporter and believer in climate change and renewable energy but all of these tenets seemed to melt away as he found increasing power in politics. To some this would appear to be hypocrisy, however to others it’s just the influence of the extreme right wing of the Liberal Party, now supported by the redneck yobbos of Sky TV and radio.

We now have as a Prime Minister a  man who threw coal onto the parliamentary table and who voted against the Royal Commission into the banking industry.

Can’t wait for a federal election.

I’m a 37-year-old husband, father and a child protection worker. I’m also a survivor of child sexual assault and a Bravehearts’ Champion for Children. Child protection is everybody’s business and we each have a vital role to play in preventing this crime that affects 58,000 Australian children every year. 

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has helped break the silence for child sexual assault victims in institutional environments and may provide some with redress.

The majority of child sexual assaults are being perpetrated by someone inside the family unit or who is known to the family. 

Mine was a good, loving and nurturing Vietnamese family but I was just eight years old when I was sexually assaulted by a close family friend. I lived trapped in a world of secrecy, guilt and shame with thoughts of suicide and self-harm, in a childhood filled with loneliness and fear. For 29 years I lived in silence, afraid to tell my story until the day I found the courage to break my silence and tell my wife, my mother, my family and friends.

Each gave me the love and support I needed to help me find my way out of the dark, lonely place I had lived for most of my life.  

Today, a child is sexually assaulted in Australia every 90 minutes – that’s one in five children who are sexually harmed in some way before their 18th birthday and yet the majority of these crimes go unreported while the children suffer, as I did, in silence. As a society, we need children to disclose sexual assault, however reports show that one in three adults wouldn’t believe a child if they disclosed while more than one in four say they lack the confidence to recognise the signs of child sexual assault.

Thanks to Bravehearts, every parent, carer or adult who works with children can each be empowered to protect our children from harm by downloading Bravehearts’ free Personal Safety Parents’ Guide to learn what they need to know to give kids simple strategies and resilience to protect themselves in a variety of situations across the span of their lives.

By getting involved in Bravehearts’ annual White Balloon Day (Friday, September 7) during National Child Protection Week (September 2-8), together we can remove the stigma, shame and secrecy surrounding child sexual assault and break the silence to give kids and survivors a voice while empowering them with the support they need to disclose any inappropriate behaviour to someone they can trust.