CHILD-FRIENDLY ADELAIDE

Mrs VLAHOS (Taylor) (14:33): My question is to the Minister for Education and Child Development. Can the minister inform the house what steps are being taken to engage young people in having a say about the planning of the built environment of Adelaide and to help build upon a reputation of Adelaide as a liveable city that supports children and families?

The Hon. G. PORTOLESI (Hartley—Minister for Education and Child Development) (14:33): I thank the member for Taylor for this important question. I know that this is a policy area that occupies a great deal of her time so I am very pleased to have this opportunity to address this question. The idea of a city that is supportive of children makes a great deal of sense for us, both from the point of view of attracting children and families to live in Adelaide and from a long-term social and economic perspective. That is why I was very pleased, just recently, to open and address a forum whose subject was, in fact, promoting a child-friendly Adelaide.

The idea of a child-friendly environment suggests we have things such as creative playgrounds, safe walking trails to school, public art works that invite children to explore and enjoy the community around them and, of course it goes without saying, very good access to services like health and education. We in the state government recognise this, which is why we are bringing together a number of services, and then together joining them with, of course, our children's centres; and can I say what a fantastic job our children's centres are doing.

It is important in this debate that we do look beyond the traditional child-oriented areas if we are to promote and develop a child-friendly Adelaide. The idea of the forum—which I understand was very successful—is to connect the experts with children to look at how we might best include child and youth-friendly principles in Adelaide's planning and development processes. I am very pleased that a number of local government areas are directly involved, and I was very pleased to see a number of mayors attending the forum. In fact, one of my own councils, the Campbelltown council, deserves a huge round of applause, which in fact has a children's plan, I think it is (I cannot remember the proper title for it), but that council is at the forefront of engaging in this area.

There was also great support from schools on the day, including contributions from children from Sturt Street Community School where, in fact, the member for Taylor's children attend—and my own child attended that childcare centre—and Gilles Street Primary School. This approach is in line with this government's priority of investing in children in the early years because that is a time when we can make a long-term difference if we are prepared to encourage creative children and engage with them. I cannot commend this work enough.