Child Protection

Ms SANDERSON (Adelaide) (15:05): My question is again to the Minister for Education and Child Development. Was the 56-year-old foster carer charged with child exploitation who appeared in court on 21 May 2015 the subject of an assessment process pursuant to the DECD guidelines, including screening? If so, when was this last reviewed?

The Hon. S.E. CLOSE (Port Adelaide—Minister for Education and Child Development, Minister for the Public Sector) (15:05): Can I make it very clear from the outset and fairly early in my term that I will not be discussing an individual case in this public forum—

Ms Chapman: Rubbish!

The Hon. S.E. CLOSE: —and I will certainly not be discussing—

Ms Chapman interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Bragg will withdraw for the remainder of question time.

The honourable member for Bragg having withdrawn from the chamber:

The Hon. S.E. CLOSE: I will particularly not be discussing an individual case where there are matters that are relating to either police investigations or court action. What I can say, although I suspect it's all on the public record and my friends with the internet could look it up for me, is that there is a standard practice and procedure for people who wish to become foster carers. It is, as one would expect, a reasonably exhaustive process. It involves not only the three yearly working with children screening but also other forms of assessment both by the government and by the foster care agency—the non-government agency through which they undertake foster care.

That said, I never wish to be complacent. I never wish to assume that a process that we do now will be the process that we should always do in the future and, if there were anything I could ever do to prevent the assault of a child in the child protection system, then I would be very interested to hear what it is and very interested in reviewing our process.

One of the challenges of the child protection system is that not only do the behaviours of people who harm children change over time, as does their capacity to hide from government and from other eyes, but so too, quite rightly, do community standards. For our child protection system, we need to be constantly vigilant to ensure that we are maintaining the best possible practice. When things go wrong, and go wrong they do, we must learn from them. We must not be defensive, and I wouldn't wish my answer to be in any way interpreted as being defensive. I do want to make sure that we're constantly improving our practice.