Libs on the way back, page-55

Alice Springs nurse leaves Karl speechless detailing child sexual abuse

Rachel Hale, who has worked as a registered nurse for almost 14 years, spoke on Tuesday of the “level of trauma and shocking occurrences of sexual violence” she had witnessed, which mean some children in Alice Springs simply do not have a safe home to which to return.

“It haunts me. I have seen a four-year-old boy come in with anal warts and a six-year-old with vaginal sores,” she told Channel 9’s Today.“A two-year-old was raped in Alice Springs last year. I have colleagues who witness things on a daily basis here, even in Darwin and the town community, where a first responder was turned out and the lights of the vehicle shone on a house, and they saw a man raping an eight-year-old girl.

“I asked, what happened to that little girl? What was she doing? Nothing, was the answer. She didn’t scream, she didn’t move, she didn’t cry out, because she is so used to that treatment.”

The descriptions were graphic and disturbing, Ms Hale said, but it was important for Australians to understand the reality of the unrest in Alice Springs.

“This is why these kids are on the street, and your viewers need to hear this,” she told the program.“It’s an uncomfortable conversation, but it’s one that needs to be addressed.”

“The brutal reality. It’s uncomfortable, it’s awful,” said host Karl Stefanovic, who was left near-speechless by the account.

Ms Hale’s interview comes more than 15 years after the federal government’s Little Children are Sacred report, which found disturbing evidence of significant child sexual abuse in Northern Territory communities — and which prompted a number of new policies, including the Stronger Futures alcohol ban that was terminated last year.

Restrictions on alcohol and movement in Alice Springs would not work unless children were given a safe home, Ms Hale said.