SOCIAL INCLUSION INITIATIVES

In reply to Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite—Leader of the Opposition) (25 June 2009).

The Hon. M.D. RANN (Ramsay—Premier, Minister for Economic Development, Minister for Social Inclusion, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Sustainability and Climate Change): I have been advised of the following:

In response to the first question put by the Hon Ian Evans MP, the increase in the Social Inclusion budget will be spent on the Social Inclusion Initiatives and is not funding for policy advice.

The variance in the budget between 2008-09 and 2009-10 is attributed to funding for two new Social Inclusion Initiatives through the Sharing Opportunities and Disability References, and decreased funding as a result of the scheduled end of a young offenders initiative ($957,000 in 2008-09) and minor adjustments of $56,000.

$4.529 million has been allocated from the 2009-10 State Budget for the delivery of two new innovative Social Inclusion Initiatives that will be established under the Sharing Opportunities Reference and Disability Reference. Delivery of these initiatives will be led by the relevant government agencies and the Social Inclusion Board, through the Social Inclusion Unit, will monitor implementation and evaluate outcomes.

In response to the second question put by Mr Evans, the Government has achieved improvements in school retention. South Australia's school retention rate has reached a 13 year high with 75.3 per cent of State government school students beginning high school in 2004 being retained to year 12 in 2008. In 1999 this retention rate was 67.2 per cent. Considerable progress has also been made towards implementing all 46 recommendations of the To Break the Cycle report to address the issue of serious repeat offending by young people.