Grievance Debate

CHILD PROTECTION

Mr PISONI (Unley) (15:11): I will use this opportunity to read into Hansard a letter I received today from a former governing council member at the western suburbs school that has been the subject of media and parliamentary debate this week. It says:

As a governing council member at the school in question during 'that' period (2009-11), I am well aware of the 'pressure' placed upon council by the Education Dept. (DECD) and the school's leadership. We were first told that we couldn't say anything in order to protect the victim or influence court proceedings. I was later made aware that the victim's family had also had 'pressure' placed on them from the department to stay quiet.

As a governing council I believe we were undertrained and unaware of what we could do and couldn't do in this situation. Furthermore, individually, we were not a wealthy group and could not pay any legal costs if it came to that, so we largely and begrudgingly took the advice of the Dept. and school's leadership. I believe that the school's leadership were also inadequately prepared to deal with this obvious conflict of interest and thus, chose to conform to the advice it was given from DECD.

There was a strong possibility that there was more than one victim. Once the perpetrator was found guilty in this initial case, several GC members again pushed to make the parents of children who attended OSHC while the perpetrator was director,

aware of what had happened,

how to approach their children about the topic or set up interviews with professionals in the field, and

provide counselling and support for any families affected.

Again GC came up against a brick wall. That attitude has continued to this point. I also believe that the officers of the Department, had mentioned that any disclosure could damage the school's reputation and make it very difficult to find a good principal (the school has yet to appoint a principal for next year...). I was told DECD had suggested that any disclosure against the direction of DECD could influence the indemnity afforded to the GC placing every member under the threat of possible litigation.

In my opinion DECD (and in the end, the school's leadership) were (misguidedly) more interested in protecting the government's, the departments' (DECD), the schools'...and personal reputations, and exposure to litigation rather than the welfare of the school community and in particular, those victims of the perpetrator.

There is no published policy on how DECD schools should deal with such a situation so I would suspect that this response was instigated by certain individuals in the DECD, backed up by the heavily funded Risk Management section of the DECD/Government. The irony is that government (and public) are justifiably appalled at the lack of transparency involved in similar incidents occurring within the Catholic Church and its educational institutions.

At the end of the last school term (term 3), the school decided to run an 'in-school' 'Paedophile Recognition' program with all students (without parent pre-approval or prior knowledge). I am aware of new victims coming forward as a consequence of this program. Almost 2 years after the perpetrator was charged! Who knows what kind of 'demons' these kids have been grappling with alone, all this time? Who knows how much anguish parents have gone through not understanding or knowing how to deal with behaviour changes within their children in this time. How long was the school and DECD and the individuals involved, prepared to let this go on for?

Other questions must also be asked and answered, and the answers published. For example,

how was it that this individual was not identified as an inappropriate candidate for such a position?...

are there checks and balances in place to lessen the threats posed by a possible abuser in such a position?...

why didn't those checks and balances work if they are indeed present,

are governing councillors (i.e. community members) and school leaders adequately equipped knowledge-wise and aptitude-wise to govern all aspects of a school including..[out of ours school care], Canteen, Budget, Human resources etc.?

is there a DECD policy pertaining to incidents of 'sexual abusive' by staff members and students?

is the governance model for public schools working to the satisfaction of the all interested parties but particularly the community without which a school would not exist?

There are many other questions that need to be asked and answered and I am not sure that anything but an independent inquiry is required as the findings could compromise the Government's, or DECD's positions. Without independence, it is more than likely to end in a DECD's officer or employee being made the 'fall guy'...

(Name withheld)

former Governing Councillor of school in question.