A Sunshine Coast woman says she has been left in limbo by Gymnastics Australia, which has not yet joined the National Redress Scheme for abuse survivors despite years of promises.
Alison Quigley, who was sexually abused as a teenage gymnast in the 1980s, has been waiting for more than two years for the sporting body to make good on its word.
The National Redress Scheme is designed to offer support to those who faced institutional child sexual abuse by offering counselling, a redress payment, and "a direct personal response" from the organisation responsible.
Ms Quigley was a national junior team champion at the age of 14 in Victoria when she was groomed and raped by 40-year-old Graham Partington in 1981.
Partington was convicted and jailed for his crimes in 2017, but it would be years before the sport would be forced to reckon with its past.
A denial in the face of the facts
The jailing of famed US gymnastics coach Larry Nassar in 2017, along with allegations from hundreds of overseas athletes, increased the scrutiny on Australian gymnastics.
Nonetheless, Gymnastics Australia chief executive Kitty Chiller claimed in 2018 that there had "never been any evidence of abuse" of Australian gymnasts.
That was despite Ms Quigley's abuser having already been convicted, as had Geoffrey Dobbs, who preyed on more than 100 girls over almost 30 years while a teacher and gymnastics coach.
The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse also published examples of child sexual abuse, including by a primary school gymnastics teacher.
Amid growing pressure after the release of the Athlete A documentary, Gymnastics Australia asked for the Australian Human Rights Commission to review the sport in 2020.
That led to the Change the Routine report in May last year, which found coaching practices created "a risk of abuse and harm" to athletes.
Ms Quigley said the findings and the response from Gymnastics Australia had given survivors hope.
"The survivor community recognised that it was time the needle shifted, and it looked as though things were going to start moving forward," she said.
In late 2020, Gymnastics Australia said in its annual report that it was signing up to the National Redress Scheme.
On average, that process takes three to six months.
A promise made, but not yet kept
Ms Quigley said she had no reason to suspect Gymnastics Australia's application would take any longer than others, so she waited about six months before applying to the scheme in mid-2021.
"At first I thought, 'Oh, that's funny, it's not coming up in the search terms' — [unlike] when you look at institutions that have signed up. It must be some administrative glitch," she said.
But two years after first flagging its intention to sign up to the scheme and 18 months since Ms Quigley applied, there has been no word from Gymnastics Australia.
"If you think about what survivors have gone through, if you think about the abuse and how they've reported it to the associations … they've done nothing — there's no trust," she said.
"We've got all this kind of silence and guardedness and privateness.
"We're not identifying individuals here, so I don't really understand why the process has to be hush-hush."
In the works, Gymnastics Australia says
Gymnastics Australia was contacted for comment about its progress multiple times by the ABC.
It declined to explain the cause of the delays or provide any message to the survivors waiting for it to join the redress scheme.
A spokeswoman confirmed Gymnastics Australia had sent a letter of intent and was "working with the scheme to complete the onboarding and assessment process".
The Department of Social Services controls the scheme and would not discuss Gymnastics Australia for privacy restrictions.
A spokesman said the department kept in touch with institutions even if they were unable to meet the scheme's financial or legal requirements in case that changed in the future.
"The scheme understands that waiting for institutions to join the scheme can be a difficult and traumatic experience," he said.
Ms Quigley has launched a parliamentary petition in the hope of driving change within the sport that she continues to adore despite the pain it has inflicted on her.
"I'm wearing two hearts, I guess, because I do love the sport," she said.
"We were in it for the joy of it — the joy of flying and the thrill of being so coordinated, and excited about just flying through the air unabated.
"What we really need to get a handle on is how we administer this sport.
"We have to do better than we are at the moment, keeping kids safe."
