Child Protection

Ms SANDERSON (Adelaide) (14:42): My question again is to the Minister for Education and Child Development. What progress, if any, has the government made in establishing a nationwide database as per recommendation 14.4(a) in the recent baby Ebony inquest?

The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Justice Reform, Minister for Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Child Protection Reform, Minister for the Public Sector, Minister for Consumer and Business Services, Minister for the City of Adelaide) (14:43): Again, I have to say we have a royal commissioner, who is looking at—

Mr Marshall: That's got nothing to do with this. This is the baby Ebony inquest findings.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: Yes, I know.

Mr Marshall interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The leader is on two warnings. The leader will listen to the answer in silence.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: We have a view that it would be prudent, given the fact that we have a royal commission underway, for us to say to the royal commissioner, 'Look, here are the various recommendations that have been coming from various coroners' reports.'

We did, in the instance of the first of those reports—the Valentine report, the one which preceded the establishment of the royal commission in the first place—immediately following that, bring a bill into the parliament dealing with matters inasmuch as legislative change was required, and the progress of that bill has been halted due to differences of opinion.

Since the time of the establishment of the Nyland commission, we have taken the view that, for the government to be out there making policy decisions, implementing them, and then finding perhaps that we have done something which was at odds with what would be recommended ultimately by Commissioner Nyland, would not be appropriate.

The Minister for Education and the chief executive of the department have been doing extensive internal work in terms of consideration of practices in the way they manage things there. But all of the recommendations and all of the questions around the way in which the department is operating are things for which we are essentially awaiting the determination of Commissioner Nyland.