Child Protection

Mr MARSHALL (Dunstan—Leader of the Opposition) (15:10): A further supplementary: has Families SA applied to the courts for drug assessments for parents who are the subject of safety plans as evidenced in the Coroner's report?

The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Justice Reform, Minister for Planning, Minister for Housing and Urban Development, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Child Protection Reform) (15:11): I don't know exactly what these questions are about.

Mr Knoll interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Schubert is warned a second and final time.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: For those who are vaguely interested in seeing this elicit some useful information, who have read—

Ms Redmond: The Coroner's report.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: Yes, indeed. The member for Heysen has hit the jackpot. If this were one of those TV shows, the big gold tick would have just come up like that.

Ms Redmond interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Heysen is warned a second and final time.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: If you read the Coroner's report, there is quite a bit of discussion about section 20(2) of the Children's Protection Act. Since that time, there have been discussions, and I think at least some of those occurred in my presence because they were at a press conference, where the chief executive of the department tried to explain the interaction between section 20(1) and section 20(2).

Section 20(1) is a particular provision which, as he explained at the press conference, he has had resort to on hundreds of occasions every year. The point he made was that an application under section 20(1) is, however you would look at it, a matter which would be covered by the subset of events which are covered by subsection (2) because subsection (2) is a subset of subsection (1) and, by definition, if you are within subsection (1), of course subsection (2), being covered by subsection (1), would be within the exemption contained in subsection (2) which carves out a space for subsection (1).