JULIA Gillard's calling of a royal commission into child sex abuse risks appearing as nothing but a diverting thought bubble unless she addresses the outstanding concerns she has raised.
Without a commissioner, terms of reference, budget or timeframe, it looks as ill-thought as almost every other Labor policy blurted out on the run.
Of very great concern is the possibility that the commission's scrutiny would be confined to an examination of churches and institutions and the ominous omission of the widespread cases of abuse within ordinary families.
This is not to ignore the importance of inquiring into institutional bodies, but the bulk of abuse occurs in homes.
It is also critical to ensure that the terms of reference ensure no group of Australians is protected by political ring-fencing. To fail to shine the spotlight on child sex abuse in every community would be to enshrine politically correct social engineering.
NT Country Liberal MP Bess Nungarrayi Price, a Warlpiri woman, was blunt in her assessment: "A lot of abuse happens out here. It needs to be addressed. Aborigines are Australians citizens, they can't be ignored or excluded."
Nor should small groups within the broader population of Muslim Australians, some of whom are only now confronting pockets of cultural abuse such as female genital mutilation - which must be covered by any commission into child sex abuse - be excluded.
Even MPs have been known to perpetrate child sex crimes.
In NSW, former Labor minister Milton Orkopoulos was jailed for a minimum nine years and three months by a Newcastle court in May, 2008, after being convicted of 28 child sex and drugs charges.
Judge Ralph Coolahan spent more than an hour detailing the former Aboriginal affairs minister's crimes, which took place between 1995 and 2006 and involved the grooming of three young boys with drugs and alcohol in exchange for sex.
Judge Coolahan said Orkopoulos used his position of authority and power to win the trust of his victims and introduced one to heroin, an act which the judge described as "a very serious offence".
"His conduct was premeditated, predatory and manipulative with far-reaching impacts," the judge said.
Just two weeks ago the whistleblower Gillian Sneddon, who had worked in Orkopoulos's Swansea electoral office, resolved a suit for outstanding damages of $438,613 against Orkopoulos and her employer, the speaker of the NSW Legislative Assembly, but lost her case against the state of NSW and was ordered to pay its legal costs, believed to be up to $175,000.
Up in the Territory, friends and enemies of the late Labor senator Bob Collins are still talking about his death in September, 2007, three days before he was due to appear in court on child sex offences, and less than three weeks before facing child pornography charges.
Collins, in hindsight a sort of NT Jimmy Savile figure, never did get to defend his reputation, nor did his accusers get their day in court, though they received compensation.
The child sex charges Collins faced dated back to the 1970s and involved four boys. On his death, The Australian newspaper reported that one of his accusers had detailed evidence against Collins to a friend more than a decade earlier.
A witness who was to give evidence at the trial corroborated the claims and said he had been approached by the Aboriginal complainant from the community of Maningrida, east of Darwin, in 1995 with disturbing allegations.
"The (male) complainant and friends were invited around to Collins' house in Darwin from Kormilda College," the witness said.
"Collins would give them drugs and alcohol and encourage them to perform sex acts."
On Collins' death, the witness was contacted by the prosecution and told his services were no longer required.
"The cops told me when they interviewed me (in 2004) that they had been trying to get him for 30 years. So it's been a longstanding issue," the witness said.
The commission might ask to see the police file on the Collins case.
Down in Tasmania last November, former Labor MP Terry Martin, who ended his parliamentary career as an independent, was convicted of creating child pornography and having sex with a 12-year-old girl. He received a wholly suspended 10-month jail sentence after evidence was heard that he suffered from Parkinson's disease and may have been affected by his medication.
Child pornography is also a major issue in today's connected society. When former ABC Collectors program host Andy Muirhead was charged with accessing child porn in 2010, and the ABC removed the show's website from the internet along with references to Muirhead, his lawyer Greg Barns compared its actions with those of the KGB.
The Tasmanian Supreme Court last month confirmed a total 10-month sentence for Muirhead for possessing 12,433 still and video images, some of which involved sadism or humiliation.
Not to forget that Queensland's inquiry encompassing the Heiner child rape case is now getting under way, with witnesses including former Labor premier Wayne Goss and former Labor prime minister Kevin Rudd to be called.
As The Daily Telegraph reported, Ireland, with a population about a fifth the size of Australia's has had four inquiries into child abuse running over a decade and costing tens of millions.
To establish the facts surrounding child abuse here, every corner of our society must be open to examination.
If not, this royal commission announcement will rapidly be seen as just another stunt.
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