A former patient of a notorious Tasmanian mental institution is renewing calls for an official apology to those who were held there.
Politicians across the political divide have acknowledged horrific things took place inside the walls of the Royal Derwent Hospital, at New Norfolk.
Built in 1827, the Royal Derwent Hospital and the Willow Court Mental Asylum held thousands of people: alcoholics; people with disabilities; those suffering from mental health problems; and young unmarried women and girls suffering “moral mania”.
Successive inquiries and reports condemned much of the treatment of patients.
Dannii Lane spent a year in the Royal Derwent in the late 1960s.
For years she had suffered sexual abuse; one of the perpetrators was a member of the Anglican Church.
That perpetrator was later de-frocked and jailed for assaults on others.
At 14 years of age, Dannii Lane was an alcoholic and self-harming.
“The police picked me up trying to jump off the Tasman Bridge and I was taken to the Royal Derwent,” she said.
A nightmare experience
Heavily sedated and often locked in seclusion, the experience still haunts her.
“I can still remember the screams, the smell of stale urine, the smell of disinfectant trying to cover the smell of urine,” she said.
“And I remember seeing women chained to the furniture, like dogs. It wasn’t a nice experience.
“I was sexually abused by one of the male attendants.
“You were never safe, you were actually safer outside the asylum than you were in, it was one of the ironies.”
There was no mental illness diagnosis at the time when Ms Lane was admitted to the Royal Derwent.
“In fact even in the 1970s, there were still people being sent there who didn’t have a diagnosis of mental illness,” she said.
“I know of one particular person who was there simply because she was underage and caught having sex – it was called ‘moral mania’.”
The Royal Derwent Hospital and Willow Court Hospital closed in 2000 under the watch of former attorney-general Judy Jackson.
“It’s just an inappropriate way for people to live. I’m sure you would agree you wouldn’t like to live like this, so why should anybody else,” she said at the time.
Little is left of the Royal Derwent Hospital, and the old Willow Court complex is largely fenced off or undergoing restoration.
It was not until 2000 that Ms Lane was diagnosed with Multiple Personality Disorder.
She has been campaigning for an apology to former patients of the Royal Derwent.
“It wasn’t until I was discharged from the mental health service as a patient in 2006 that I was actually able to start talking about it,” she said.
Ms Lane said many former patients were still in the system and too afraid to speak out for fear of retribution.
A long wait for an apology
For years politicians have said they would consider a formal apology, including the then-deputy premier Lara Giddings in 2008.
“There are the wrongs of the past that do need to be confronted,” she said at the time.
After raising the matter at a forum two years ago, Dannii Lane had some hope.
There was this response from the head of Tasmania’s Mental Health Services, Professor Mark Oakley Browne: “Accepting responsibility and apologising for transgressions is an important part of healing”.
And a commitment from the then-minister for human services, Cassy O’Conner: “Certainly I am determined that the parliament will apologise to the former residents of Willow Court, Royal Derwent”.
But Dannii Lane is still waiting.
“I don’t think any government wants to accept the responsibility for such a catastrophic failure of looking after people in their care in state care,” she said.
Miranda Ashby, from mental health advocacy group Flourish, is backing the push for an apology.
“We were of the understanding that an apology was close but that other agendas got in the way, and of course another election came by, so now we’re calling on the new State Government to actually stand up and apologise,” she said.
“It is one of the top key consumer issues in the mental health space in Tasmania, it won’t go away.”
Ms Ashby said an apology would show that the Hodgman government was committed to improved Mental Health services.
“Particularly when they also are looking at the rethink mental health project which is a review of Tasmania’s mental health system and looking forward, so what better way to start looking [than] by actually closing the door on this particular part of our history.”
Darren Carr from Tasmania’s Mental Health Council was asked if an apology was being delayed because the Royal Derwent Hospital only closed relatively recently, some former workers are still in the mental health system and may feel they were being blamed for past practices.
“If that’s offered as an excuse, as a reason to not apologise to people with a mental illness, then that’s treating people with mental illness as second-class citizens compared to other people who are vulnerable and have suffered abuse,” he said.
“If churches offered that as a reason for not giving an apology it would not be accepted. We don’t think that’s an acceptable reason to not apologise in this case either.”
Dannii Lane says there are numerous precedents.
“Victims of forced adoptions, the Stolen Generation and former wards of the state have all received formal apologies from State Parliament.”
“Former patients of the Royal Derwent are a forgotten people from a forgotten institution and I think the governments of the day, past and present, would like it to stay that way – forgotten.
“To me that smacks of selective discrimination based on disability. So I’ve actually approached the Anti-Discrimination Commission, and I’m lodging a claim of discrimination under the disability components of the Act.”