Principal Community Visitor

Mr DULUK (Davenport) (14:34): My question is to the Minister for Disabilities. Minister, at what point in the last 24 hours did you recall your ongoing engagement with the Principal Community Visitor?

The Hon. K.A. HILDYARD (Reynell—Minister for Disabilities, Minister Assisting the Minister for Recreation and Sport) (14:34): Thank you to the member for his question. Since becoming the Minister for Disabilities, I have had the great pleasure of meeting and working with many wonderful people with disabilities, their families, their carers and, of course, the sector. One of the first people I called when I came into this portfolio was the Principal Community Visitor, Mr Maurice Corcoran.

Maurice and the many volunteers who work with him do invaluable work across our state in advocating for quality care and quality support for people with disability, and this is why our state government recently reappointed Mr Corcoran as community visitor until 2020. It is also the reason that as Minister for Disabilities together with the South Australian government we have continued to argue that as quality and safeguarding responsibility for disability services transfer to the federal jurisdiction, community visiting needs to continue.

I am really pleased that the commonwealth government is in the process of conducting a scoping study into community visitation in the context of the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Along with other state ministers, I am keenly awaiting the outcome of this study. At next week's national Disability Reform Council meeting, I will again be emphasising South Australia's position that community visitation must continue once the National Disability Insurance Scheme is rolled out.