Health Minister Mark Butler is seeking an urgent briefing from health officials after a series of Crikey disclosures on the Morrison government’s funding of faith-based rehabilitation services.
His office said Butler had sought the briefing on the status of grants made to the Pentecostal-linked Esther Foundation and the Hillsong-linked one80TC rehab facilities, as well as “assessment processes” in place for “private rehabilitation services receiving Commonwealth funds”.
Crikey’s reports on the rehab facilities were described as “concerning”.
Crikey has revealed what appears to be direct political intervention from the Morrison government in grants to the two faith-based facilities. Both were awarded multimillion-dollar grants on the eve of the 2019 election through Health Department-administered grants programs and with no clear explanation of the process.
As we revealed earlier this year, former prime minister Scott Morrison personally pledged $4 million to the Perth-based Esther Foundation, which has since gone into voluntary administration after evidence emerged that girls and young women had been subjected to religious-based abuse at the facility for well over a decade.
A document Crikey obtained through freedom of information showed the foundation had made a request for funding directly to the office of then health minister Greg Hunt four weeks before Morrison’s announcement at Esther HQ.
This week we reported on the case of the one80TC rehab facility which received $1.8 million in federal grants, also on the eve of the 2019 election . According to Crikey sources the grant request was initially denied by the department and was approved only after the government was lobbied by interests linked to the rehab facility.
A former one80TC resident who was required to attend Hillsong church services and to work providing unpaid labour at Hillsong events — including washing Brian Houston’s luxury car — described the facility as “a Hillsong indoctrination centre with a mild interest in rehab”.
Butler’s move to get to the bottom of how and why the grants were made honours a commitment he made before the May election, when details emerged of the abuse of residents undergoing rehab at the Esther Foundation. It has emerged that girls as young as 14 were subject to exorcisms and to prayer sessions dedicated to ridding them of the “evil” of homosexuality.
As opposition health spokesman Butler said it was “just not good enough” and that people “will want to know what due diligence was conducted” before funding was approved for the Esther Foundation. Butler’s move adds to a West Australian parliamentary inquiry into the Esther Foundation which will begin hearing testimony from former residents next week.
Butler’s action might also bring some much-needed transparency and accountability to how the government allocates taxpayer dollars to faith-based rehab organisations which have operated in an environment where there has been little regulation of standards.
It might also bring some transparency to the Health Department. Crikey first sought answers about the funding of one80TC from the department last week and was told to expect an answer within 24 hours. But more than a week later the department has not responded with an explanation of how it came to approve close to $2 million in public money.
If Butler can restore at least some form of accountability it will be enormously helpful, not only in terms of public trust but above all to vulnerable people in questionable rehab who have no voice.
If you have any information you wish to share, please contact David Hardaker at dhardaker@protonmail.com.
Organised religion is a scam. It has no place in a modern society and certainly shouldnt be funded by a secular government and that includes giving them tax free status. Thats an abomination. Such cults should be funded by their members. If the members wont support it, let it die.
Yes, the tax-free status is an abomination. It’s made much more egregious by not even requiring tax returns. If anyone granted the exemption had to submit an accurate statement of income and assets each year at least we would know what this exemption costs. As it is, we have no idea how generous we are. This is of course the reason why it is set up that way. Would not want an informed debate about their tax status, would we?
Accountability and transparency can only exist within Democracy. That is why both must be defended. Our nation dodged a bullet at last election.
Considering that the Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison government was democratically elected for 9 years, the relationship between democracy, transparency, and accountability may not be as robust as you assume.
Mmmmm, good point, Frank. I wonder if we will ever get the details, especially from this last term. Fortunately, it looks as if our new govt. is going to dig for transparency which could include (when FICAC is up and running) actually calling people to appear, a specific in-depth audit by the auditor general’s office.and details on whether or not there is any truth in the suspicions and allegations. Either way, yes or no, we need to know the result.
Well done and congratulations to Crikey and Hardaker. Let’s hope Butler sees this through.
There still remains the bigger problem discussed in an earlier article: there’s so little effort made or resource provided for the services required by these various vulnerable groups that far too often they are left with Hobson’s choice: either whatever these religious bodies are offering, or else nothing at all. As someone who was quoted in that article pointed out, there are no votes in it. Often quite the opposite.
Popular support can be won for all kinds of public policy initiatives, not automatically, but through skilled advocacy and thoughful implementation.
Decimal currency, the metric system, merit based immigration, native title, Medicare, free university tuition, the National Gallery, SBS, the GST, the Apology, the NDIS are some examples.
None of those examples, except possibly the NDIS a little bit, is really comparable to the reasons why policies to help these groups meet either indifference or hostility. The inevitable NIMBY reaction by local residents to the proposed siting of any facility to help, say, drug addicts or the mentally ill, is incredibly difficult to overcome. The number of people who would switch their vote to a candidate if that candidate begins campaigning for spending on better prison conditions is never all that big. Persuading people to accept decimal currency is pushing an open door by comparison.
Can you identify any benefits to the community of effective treatment and management programs for drug affected and mentally ill people, SSR?
That’s sarcasm, right?
No, it’s a challenge to try to sell what he is saying is difficult to sell.
Decimal currency, and the metric system were hard sells at the time, because people were habituated to the old ways.
Social change is difficult, even when it leads to better outcomes.
The ability to persuade people to change is what differentiates visionary leaders from political opportunists.
Exactly. All that had to be overcome with decimal currency and some others in your list was an old habit or replacing something familiar. Whereas the obstacles to be overcome in getting help for those the religious charities often offer to help are prejudices based on some or all of the following:
And so on. But it’s wonderful you see no reason it cannot be done, and I hope you have the decency to put your belief into action by getting into politics, showing the leadership you say is lacking, and transforming our society for the better. Or at the very least revealing the secret to some of our current politicians. Please!
Ha! I say that to my friends who say there’s nobody good in politics.
The trouble is that the business of politics involves climbing the greasy pole of either the ALP or the Coalition to get into power.
Or in America, the GOP or the Democrats.
Those filters mean voters are left with a choice of two people who are good at triumphing in systems that have selection criteria which bear little relevance to the real challenges of improving society.
I like the system in Switzerland. Instead of a prime minister, the parliament elects an Executive Council of the 7 top vote getters, which rules for 4 years with the Chair alternating each year.
It means you get 7 different interests represented e.g. climate, economic growth, labor rights, banking, small business, family, corporations and they are incentivised to assist each other because none has the chair for long enough to get anything done in isolation.
I live in an affluent area where there is a large, prominent rehab centre run by Salvation Army. Drug addicts take regular walks through the park, and receive warm greetings from ordinary people. The local residents are, I think, on the whole proud of the work done at the facilty, and not at all scared or put off by drug addicts.
Why? The benefits are obvious. At least, they are in this area, where they are well sold. Drug treatment is directly responsible for lower crime, lower family breakups, and a stronger economy.
How do I know that? My local member of parliament told me, and my local police.
What’s more, by encountering the patients walking through the park, sober, saying heartfelt hellos, and complimenting my dog, I experience them as humans, not “drug addicts” or “criminals”.
If the centre had been configured differently, with high walls and barbed wire, and the patients were kept out of the park and away from the community, the residents might fear them and want to close the facility down.
It takes courage, understanding, and a lot of consultation to make a facility like this work the right way. That’s not really incredibly difficult, unless you are a short term fixer like a Morrison – it just takes time and application.
So, back to the original comment, I don’t agree “there are no votes in it.” The last election shows that the electorate is willing to consider candidates who have progressive social agendas. The Green candidates who won in my city of Brisbane have long histories of working with the community to achieve worthwhile social reforms.
Green councillor Jonathon Sri has gone from a freaky looking outlier to an established leader of the Green movement simply by doing what he believes in tirelessly, overcoming skepticism through consultation and advocacy.
The prime minister, Mr Albanese, established his credentials through a long period of effective leadership in the house when he got significant legislation passed for the minority Gillard government.
How? By listening and understanding the views of other members, and working with them constructively.
I very much appreciate your comment and the good points it makes. But it seems to support my argument rather more than yours; the facility you describe is being run by a strongly religious organisation. It would be interesting to see how local opinion would change if it was run by the council. So, exactly as I said at the start of this exchange,
“these various vulnerable groups … far too often … are left with Hobson’s choice: either whatever these religious bodies are offering, or else nothing at all.”
Your point that you quote about the only good implementations coming from religious organisations may be an accurate statement about the status quo, but does it have to be that way?
The other point you quoted was “there are no votes in it.”
Is that the case, or might the last election have told us something else is possible?
The Salvation Army facility is right on the border of Ryan and Brisbane, two electorates won by Greens in the last election.
The voters in those electorates clearly voted for something other than what Murdoch, 7. 9 and 10 were selling.
If drug, alcohol and mental illness responses were not part of it, I think they could be, because the benefits to the community, the economy, and to individuals are so great.
Drug dependence isn’t just a lower socio economic problem. Addiction is rife amongst professionals and high income earners too.
These treatment programs have to be sold effectively to catch on though – not as help for the desparate, which is easy to dismiss by selfish people, but as lifestyle necessities that boost the economy.
If there were votes in it the polticians would be getting involved, proposing to fund and run such things. They don’t unless they are pretty much forced to and then they often face a backlash from the public for ‘rewarding’ those who deserve nothing. For example, any program to help delinquent children will be portrayed as spending money on nice things for young thugs which should have gone to decent folk. It’s a simple criticism easy to grasp, and so its far more persuasive than any fancy arguments about the long-term benefit of turning their young lives around so they become productive members of society.
So the politicians know better than to risk losing votes by taking responsibility, they stand back and just say nice things about the charities who pick up the pieces. The charities need not be so sensistive about some section of the public not liking what they are doing, and the public tends not to care so much about how the charities are spending money, because at least it’s not tax-payers’ money. (This is of course a bit odd, because a lot of it still is tax-payers’ money, thanks to the exemptions.) And the charities tend to be religious.
To see how really bad it is, look beyond the assistance being given to the homeless and addicts and other vulnerable or desperate individuals, to something that really should be easy for our politicians to support – education. Just look at the horrible plight of state schools and the inability of our politicians to provide any more than minimal resources. Yet the private schools run by churches are always wonderfully well provided for with very generous hand-outs of tax-payers’ cash.
Tax payers hate seeing their tax money going to anyone lower down the ladder.
The Salvation Army do not discriminate or judge people for who they are or what they do or how they look. Nor does “one” have to be a member of any religion to seek help.
Yes of course. That’s true of just about all the religious groups involved in such activity amongst the vulnerable. What point are you trying to make?
Morrison handing out taxpayer dollars to his Shameless hypocrite FAKE christian mates. Religion is a business, conning money out of people who think that they can buy their way into heaven. As a business it needs to be taxed instead of sucking money out of the taxation system.
Please god,…, please bring back Christopher Hitchens.
I see what you did there…