Institutions who deliberately restructure their organisations so they can't be held accountable to the national child abuse redress scheme should face levies, federal Labor says.
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The opposition's social services spokeswoman Linda Burney has introduced a raft of amendments to a government bill that makes technical changes to the scheme.
Ms Burney says it's a lost opportunity to improve the scheme and put abuse survivors first, so is instead attempting to make changes.
She's been told Jehovah's Witnesses has restructured itself to dodge the scheme.
"I find (it) absolutely abhorrent that institutions that have responsibility of past trauma actually are going about restructuring themselves so they cannot be accountable to this scheme," Ms Burney told parliament on Wednesday.
"In these rare cases we are calling on the government to consider placing a levy on such institutions in order to cover the cost of redress and collect funds from these institutions through the tax system, if need be.
"Survivors should not miss out on the opportunity to get redress because an institution refuses to take responsibility."
The multibillion-dollar scheme was designed to deliver redress to the tens of thousands of people sexually abused as children in Australian institutions.
It provides access to counselling, a redress payment and a direct personal response such as an apology from an institution, if the survivor wants it.
But they can't be given redress unless the institution they were abused by has joined the scheme.
Kenja Communications and the Lakes Entrance Pony Club are also holding out on joining the scheme.
Ms Burney has met Social Services Minister Anne Ruston to discuss Labor's proposals.
Labor's amendments include making governments the "funder of last resort" if an institution is defunct or doesn't have the capacity to join the scheme.
It also includes increasing the cap on payments from $150,000 to $200,000 and ensuring survivors have access to ongoing psychological counselling and support.
As of mid-January there had been a little over 9200 applications to the scheme, with close to 5500 decisions made.
More than 4600 applications have been finalised, with payments totalling about $385.2 million.
Liberal MP Bridget Archer says she's supportive of her government's move to strip institutions of their charity status if they refuse to join the scheme, but more needs to be done.
"Our responses to the issues of child sexual abuse must go further," she told parliament.
"We must make greater efforts to prevent abuse happening in the first place. And we must have a more wholistic approach to recognising and addressing trauma to mitigate the lifelong damage caused to victims and survivors."
The federal government has given institutions until 2028 to join the scheme.
Australian Associated Press
