Bills

Appropriation Bill 2018

Estimates Committees

Debate resumed.

Mr ODENWALDER (Elizabeth) (19:30): Picking up roughly where I left off, I move on to the police portfolio. Road safety, as important as it is to me, took longer than I expected. The major cut, and one of the more inexplicable cuts, was the $38 million savings target for SAPOL over the next four years. This budget measure was made with the express proviso that it does not touch front-line police services. Quite a lot of the questioning in estimates from me; from the member for Croydon, the leader; and from the member for Kaurna was about how this could be done.

From my reading, the minister simply could not put his finger on any particular measure. He put it to the commissioner, which is only proper as the commissioner makes those decisions, but the target itself is the problem. I am advised that SAPOL spends something like 80 per cent of its budget on wages, as I am sure most public sector organisations do. Of that, 90-odd per cent is spent on active sworn police officers. I do not have the maths in front of me, but it does not leave very much from which to save $38 million over four years.

As I said, the minister could not give us any guidance about where the advice came from that that was the figure that should be saved, and he could not give us any advice about any preliminary discussions he had had with the commissioner about where those savings might be met. That something that we as the opposition will be watching very closely over the next four years.

We also explored with the minister the delay of the December cadet intake. There is a delay in the budget that at first seems fairly innocuous—it seems like a savings measure. If a bit odd, it just seems like a way to save a few bucks along the way. However, it affects the ability of the government to achieve its ongoing target of 4,713 active sworn police officers. This is a target that both the opposition and the government have now committed to, and it is as set in stone as any of these figures are. It is hard to see how this is going to be met in a continual way.

The minister points to a 30 June figure, that this number of 4,713 will be met or exceeded every 30 June. That is fine. He talked about fluctuations between attrition and recruitment. That is fine: obviously, you cannot very accurately foresee how many people will retire or leave the police. What you can do, though, is control how many people you recruit, give or take a few who leave or who are otherwise dismissed along the way. However, if you have a gap or a delay of a cadet intake, if you have a target like that you need continual recruitment against attrition. That is obvious.

If you have a gap, you are going to see not just a fluctuation but a steady decline as people leave the police over the six months. As I said, you cannot accurately predict attrition, but you can at least more or less presume a certain amount of attrition. It is very difficult to see, but we are going to reach a point in April, May or June when the figure really is going to fall quite considerably below 4,713, you would think. Again, we will be watching this very closely—as will the Police Association, I am sure—to see how the targets are being met. I think that even the 30 June figure will be very difficult for the government to meet. It remains to be seen, of course, but I think it will be very difficult to meet.

There is no mention in the budget, of course, of Crimestoppers funding. This was funding which the previous government put in place and which was not honoured by the budget. The minister, in his usual way, did not quite answer where it could come from, apart from pointing to the in-kind support that SAPOL do give to Crimestoppers, which we all know is important and we all know would continue. I did have various questions planned along the lines of SAPOL's own contribution and a detailed analysis of their own contribution to Crimestoppers. What is more important in the immediate term is the nearly $1 million that has been cut, that is not going to be provided to Crimestoppers over the next four years.

For those who do not know the history, Crimestoppers was initially funded by BankSA. That funding was withdrawn and they have been eating steadily into their cash reserves. They came to the previous government last year to fill that funding gap in order to run their programs. They recently ran a very successful program to highlight the use of ice and to encourage people to report to the police any instances of ice, and I am told that we have seen a decrease in the use of ice over the last year, which is very pleasing. I have unfortunately run out of time, but I hope to continue these remarks in a grievance debate.

Ms HILDYARD (Reynell) (19:36): I rise to speak on this bill and, in relation to it, on a matter of great importance on a development in football that is both groundbreaking and historic. After 54 long years or, as one fan put it to me a few months ago over a chat at the Port Adelaide-South Adelaide match, after around 19,800 days or around 474,000 hours, a senior South Adelaide Football Club side claimed a premiership this year.

On ANZAC Day, our South Adelaide Football Club's women's team took on the Norwood Football Club, reigning premiers, in the second year of the SANFL women's competition grand final. After a spectacular and somewhat nail-biting game, which was well fought by both sides, the South Adelaide Club, which I am very proud to be a member and board member of, came out on top by five points.

I put on record my congratulations to this fine team and all who support them. Congratulations also to the valiant Norwood Football Club on an excellent performance and for digging in when things were tough. They put up a very good fight that certainly gave many from the blue and white army quite a fright. It was brilliant to see a large, and at times very loud, crowd vociferously supporting their teams, demonstrating the growing support for women's football here in our state.

Mr Cowdrey: There was a lot of rum in there. It was nice.

Ms HILDYARD: Was there? Okay, thank you. Amongst them, it was particularly pleasing to see so many young girls and boys cheering for their sporting heroes and to see so much emotion from long-term supporters of both these well-regarded football clubs, clubs that bring people together in communities on opposite sides of town, equally passionate about the team that lies in the heart of their respective suburbs.

This incredible game followed a strong season by the South Adelaide Football Club of nine wins and only one loss, which put us at the top of the ladder throughout the season. It also followed a fine season and a year in which it was indicated that the Woodville West Torrens and Central District football clubs would join this competition, a competition that means there is now a pathway from school and local club footy to the SANFL, to the AFL, for every girl who aspires to take her football dreams as far as they can possibly go.

Winning the premiership in our inaugural season in the competition is testament to the vision and hard work of a number of people: our extraordinary coach, Krissie Steen, and all the coaching crew; the outstanding, big-hearted, determined players, whose support for one another saw them finding a whole family of sisters; CEO, Neill Sharpe; staff; volunteers; our women's committee; our sponsors; and our supporters. This was truly a team effort, and a team victory that every member can be proud of and that speaks to the enormous hearts of the women on the oval and the work done off the oval to ensure that in fielding a team every aspect of our culture and operations as a club were reviewed to ensure that these women were equally included in every aspect of club life.

Together, amongst many other initiatives, our club worked hard to secure equal representation of men and women on the board, to flag constitutional changes to include girls and women in the rules of the club and to ensure that access to training facilities and the club's traditional celebrations were equal. The South Adelaide Football Club will continue to work towards equality in all that it does because we proudly understand that we are indeed stronger together.

Throughout the season and in the lead-up to, during and beyond the ground final, it was wonderful to see our southern community backing these women in. I know that many local community members are deeply proud of what they achieved. Throughout the season, as have many other clubs who worked to develop the girls' and women's competition, South Adelaide proudly saw its membership and sponsorship base grow. Thank you to all who signed up for the South Adelaide Football Club's inaugural women's membership and to corporate and individual player sponsors for providing the young women of South Adelaide with the opportunity to chase their dreams. Well done also to the SANFL on this competition, and on their work to grow women's footy in our beautiful state.

At the commencement of the AFL Women's competition, there were around 16 clubs with women's or girls' teams here in South Australia. That number is now well over 100, which speaks to the adage that 'If you can't see it, you can't be it.' It tells us that when girls and women can see what is possible in women's football, and when all women in sport are celebrated, supported and covered in terms of the media, girls and women get the message that their place in football is no longer on the sidelines but jostling for the first touch following the centre bounce, bumping someone off the ball, or kicking from 50 straight through the big white goalposts.

Thank you also to Statewide Super for their leadership, vision and passion to support equality in sport. Their support for girls and women in sport has been instrumental in making this growing league as strong as it is and in encouraging other businesses to back women's sport.

Following the grand final victory in May, I was moved, happy and proud to support the South Adelaide Football Club's women's best and fairest and very honoured to present the inaugural best and fairest medal to the invincible Nikki Gore, a young woman who lives in Christies Beach in the heart of Reynell. Nikki is supported by her twin sister, Amy—who, incidentally, is taking the pro-surfing circuit by storm across the country and beyond—and her brilliant mum, Fiona, who instils in her girls that anything is possible and that their place in sport is wherever they want it and dream it to be. We expect to see Nikki Gore in next week's draft, and so many of these brilliant SANFL women following in her footsteps.

It was brilliant also to see recognised Cheyenne Hammond as the players' MVP, Lisa Whiteley as the most ferocious player, Courtney Gum as leading goal kicker, and Elyse Haussen, who received the coach's award. A number of these awards were presented by coach Krissie Steen and her team. Krissie and her team were outstanding in empowering these young women to develop their football skills, to develop resilience and commitment, and to be part of a team who were deeply connected and supportive of one another on and off the oval, who believed in themselves and their abilities, who deeply believed that they could win and, most importantly, believed in their power to inspire others to follow in their footsteps.

Well done to all these award winners. The Panthers were rightly named in the The Advertiser SANFLW Team of the Year with Krissie Steen as coach, our fabulous co-captain Kristi Harvey as centre half-forward, Jaslynne Smith as half-back, Cheyenne Hammond as back pocket, Nikki Gore as rover, who also won the SANFL Breakthrough Player award, and Elyse Haussen on the interchange. I am proud to have played a small part in helping to get this extraordinary group of women going in the SANFL women's football competition, and am so very inspired by the courageous and skilful way these women play and how they support one another.

Thank you again to everyone who shaped our culture into one where girls and women are able to equally and actively participate and play the game they love. It has been a privilege to celebrate the outstanding efforts of these women and to celebrate just how far we have come in growing women's footy in our state. Thank you to everyone who has put their heart and soul into doing this and into giving girls and women the pathway and inspiration to follow their football and sporting dreams. Thank you again to all who know the power of sport to provide a shining example of what it is possible to achieve in terms of equality both on and off the oval when we truly include everyone in the sport they love.

With the background of this historic growth, it is indeed devastating that the South Adelaide Football Club, the Woodville West Torrens Football Club and so many community clubs in South Australia have been let down by this cruel government, let down in that they callously cut the final fully funded round of the former Labor government's female facilities program. So many clubs have come to me and others on this side of the house to speak about how upset they were after their volunteers put such incredible effort into their applications.

There were clubs in all codes, everywhere from Hallett Cove and Morphett Vale to Kalangadoo, Woodville, Whyalla and everywhere in between. There are other clubs who desperately need facilities who wanted to apply in future rounds but, cruelly, the female facilities program has been cut altogether and the pittance that this government will put towards grants is so much less. It is contingent on club and council funding and it locks out numerous codes altogether. If you play rugby, soccer, basketball or hockey, you are locked out altogether from any of these grants.

The fact is that no matter which way the government spin this they have let girls and women down. They do not support women in sport, they do not support local community clubs and they absolutely do not support equality. You only have to look at the appallingly low representation of women on that side of the house to see this. South Australian girls and women deserve so much better. Club officials, athletes, coaches and supporters will not stop until they are better treated and respected by this government through funding.

They know, and we on this side of the house know, that when we see women and girls play sport at the highest level, how we see them is transformed, and that gives us an immense opportunity to address all sorts of issues that we grapple with that arise through the lack of gender equality. They also know the cost that comes with gender equality and a lack of appropriate facilities in sport.

I was talking just the other day to a mother at a football club who, before they had the opportunity to start renovating their change rooms, was in those change rooms with a group of under-18 girls who play football. Because of the state of the change rooms and the way that they are configured, a man came into those change rooms thinking he was just going to the bathroom via the door through which he usually went. That mother had to quickly take that group of under-18 girls out of there, not because anything the man was doing was inappropriate but just simply because of the way that those change rooms are configured. Luckily, that club was the recipient of a grant from our former Labor government and those facilities are and will continue to be redeveloped so that they are appropriate.

We have heard many stories in this house of women and girls having to change in toilets, in their cars or simply having to go home after games to be able to change, and there are certainly many stories of girls and women not having the place to debrief, to be briefed, to prepare before and after games. The lack of commitment by those opposite to advancing the interests of women and girls is not just evident in their cruel cut to female facilities, almost every budget measure has a particularly negative impact on women.

We know that the fastest growing group of people experiencing homelessness is older women, yet for those who are more vulnerable and living in Housing SA homes we cruelly jack up their rent and put them at risk by forcing them into having to make choices about whether to pay the rent, to buy food or to access medicines they may need.

In addition to my office being inundated with calls from people absolutely appalled at the female facilities program being slashed—a program that would have improved facilities for all—it is also being inundated with calls about this government's impending cruel cuts to bus services, to Service SA centres, and to funding for community safety measures like CCTV cameras, managed taxi ranks and so much more.

Shockingly, there is not one dollar in this budget for domestic violence prevention, not one dollar. It is, of course, the responsibility of all of us to prevent and end domestic violence, but without any resources whatsoever for organisations and community members to develop programs to do this it makes it just so much harder.

In estimates, I asked both the Minister for Human Services and the Minister for Recreation and Sport about their definition of gender equality, a question I would have thought everybody in this house should be able to answer. Neither of them could give an answer. It was simply brushed off as an unimportant question or as an issue for someone else. When I asked the Minister for Human Services about what the plan was to achieve gender equality in terms of the parliamentary representation of those opposite—the second worst representation of women in the country—again there was no clear answer given. That is so because they do not have one.

This government, through its budget, through its lack of any plan to include women in this parliament, through its comments about women's faces, and through its cruel cuts in so many areas, has shown its utter disregard for the girls and women of South Australia.

Ms STINSON (Badcoe) (19:51): This is a budget of cruel cuts, privatisations and closures. In the portfolios of the arts and child protection, there are cuts to funding, cuts to services, outsourcing of front-line programs and the closure of important initiatives. There is also a glaring lack of vision.

I was hoping that after making inquiries through estimates, the details gleaned from that might enlighten some plan or overarching strategy from this government or, at the very least, some reasons for the slashing that had occurred, but unfortunately not. Budgets are, of course, always a statement of priorities. The numbers reveal where the focus is, and it is clearly not on us or on child protection.

In terms of child protection, I am not sure whether it was more outrageous, or whether it has been more outrageous, that this minister has been claiming achievements and improvements in some areas, like kinship carers and the reduction in CARL call waiting times, despite doing absently nothing to achieve them herself, or the very galling title of her budget media release, which states, 'Child protection is a priority', while at the same time stripping services like financial counselling from families who need it most. The hypocrisy is pretty amazing.

This is a budget that fails on the basics. The child protection budget is quite simply built on a lie. Forecasts in the budget are for 33 additional children in state care this financial year. I would like to see an increase of zero; in fact, I would like to see a decrease, and I am sure everyone in this house would join me in that, but that is just not in keeping with what is likely and what is reality—and budgets, if nothing else, need be based in reality. What is the point if they are not?

In the Budget and Finance Committee this Monday just gone we heard that there have been 210 to more than 400 extra children coming into the child protection system each year over the past five years. Even if that rate of increase were halved—and I hope it is—which is what the minister has actually committed to estimates, that would still be an increase of 96 children each year. In fact, she aims to achieve that target in two years, not one.

This is a pretty basic mathematical failure. There is a very big difference between 33 children and 96 children, and a huge difference between 96 children and 210 children and 400 children. Really, that is a bit surprising from someone with a background as an accountant. The minister stated in estimates:

I would expect that figure—

that is, the 33—

to be higher…I am advised that that is not a figure that our department gets to set. It is to do with budgeting and money coming in, not actual numbers.

If the budget is not based on actual numbers, then we have a problem on our hands. We heard in estimates from the minister that the budget is now being rewritten. Rewritten? The ink is barely dry on this budget and it has to be rewritten, and that is because she confirmed in estimates—and her department officials in Monday in the Budget and Finance Committee—that 33 is not a realistic estimate when it comes to the increase of children in care. It is not what she is expecting to transpire in reality, and it is not what the department is expecting either. What a glaring failure. The first budget and you cannot even get the basics on which your budget is built right.

We also found out in estimates that this is the figure given to the department by Treasury. You can just imagine the scene, really, can't you? It should be the case that the department is saying, 'Look, this is the increase we're expecting in the number of children in care. This is how many children we're expecting to have to care for.' But, no, it went quite the opposite way, I am sure, where Treasury said, 'This is how much money you're getting; now work out the estimate of how many children you can actually afford to care for, how many extra children this budget will actually be able to care for.'

Clearly, the answer to that was 33, which is a long way off the aim of 96 and the reality, which looks a lot more like 210 to 400 additional children into the system. It is a pretty farcical way to construct what is meant to be a guiding document and a plan not just for the year but for four years ahead.

So what are the ramifications of taking this approach? It has to result in either a budget blowout or poor support for children and families who need it most. We know that just leads to more cost. It leads to more pressure, not just on the child protection system but also on other departments, like education, health, the criminal justice system and the human services system as well. So really it is not much of a saving at all.

There was also the confession that either there is no modelling or maybe they just do not want to disclose any modelling there is when it comes to the change in children entering the system as an impact of the implementation of the new Children and Young People (Safety) Act. The act makes fundamental changes, yet it is strange that in the department or the minister's office there is no estimates and no modelling that has been done about what impact that will have on the child protection system. It is probably why they have to redraw the budget so suddenly.

This budget—the child protection budget, that is—also sought to redefine what reduction even means. It is not actually reducing the number of children in care, according to this minister; it is reducing the growth in the number of children in care. Asked for what her goal was for reducing the number of kids in care, as I mentioned, the minister replied that she wanted a rise confined to 3.3 per cent within two years, so that is 96 children a year but not achieved for another two years. That is actually not fewer children; it is more. That is a rise in the number of children coming into the child protection system.

Of course, it is admirable to slow the number of children coming into care. We all want that. We want to see not just a slowing, we want to see a genuine reduction. On this side, we support a slowing and an ultimate reduction. But a slowed increase is not a reduction. It simply does not match the rhetoric. So what we heard before the election about cutting the number of children in care is actually not even the plan. It is not what is in the budget; it is not what is being aimed for. It is simply a slowing that is being aimed for, not an actual reduction in the number of children in care.

The other point worth noting is that the growth in the number of children in care was actually already slowing. It started under Labor quite some years ago. We got those figures—in fact, they were pretty broadly known already—reiterated and updated in the Budget and Finance Committee on Monday. They reveal that between 2015 and 2016 there was a 14 per cent increase in children coming into care compared to the previous year, and that was a pretty bad year. The following year there was a 7.5 per cent rise, and then between 2017 and 2018 there was a 6.6 per cent rise. So, as you can see, it is coming down—a considerable slowing, in fact, in just three years, from around 14 per cent to 6 per cent.

The minister's stated aspiration of a 3.3 per cent reduction in the number of children in care to be achieved in two years' time would simply follow the trajectory, though rather more slowly than it was already being achieved under Labor, nothing more than that. This budget redefines what is meant by this government in terms of a reduction. A reduction is not really reduction at all, it is just a slower increase.

In this budget, the spin simply does not match the substance. The budget day spin was that a $30.9 million boost was being injected into caring for children in state care. It sounded good, but when we looked at that it was actually just $7.3 million this year and the rest—$23.6 million, the bulk of it—was whacked on to last year's budget to drive up the deficit so that the Treasurer could claim a worse financial position than he had inherited for this fledgling government. It is following a theme of blame the person who came before rather than take responsibility now that you are in government.

Worse still, there is no additional money in years 2, 3 and 4 of the forward estimates, no increase in funding, no extra funding to be able to care for children who need our care so badly. Either this crisis in child protection being claimed by the Liberals will be entirely solved this financial year or we are set for a budget blowout or we are going to see some recalculations in the midyear economic review and we know that is probably the most likely option because we have already been told that the child protection budget is right this moment being redrawn because we know that the fundamentals that it is based on, that 33 number, is wrong.

This is straight out of the Lucas bag of tricks circa 16 years ago to just blame everything, push everything back to the previous budget and blame someone else. But it is a pretty unfair area to be swindling the figures. It is a really important area, child protection, and if nothing else we should be honest with the public about what it really costs to care for children, what the different methods of care cost and how many children are likely to come into our system. At least then we can give them some assurance that those children who are unfortunate enough to need our help are going to get good quality help and that we have budgeted for it and we can afford it.

This is a heartless and short-sighted child protection budget. The so-called outsourcing of the financial wellbeing program is shameful. It is not even outsourcing; it is just a cut. This is a service that works both ends of the spectrum when it comes to child protection. It is working with families who are likely to come into the child protection system or have already had attention from the department. These financial counsellors—59 FTEs but a bit over 60 individuals—sit down with families and they find out what is going wrong in their finances. As we all know from our daily lives, no matter how lucky we are, finances can be a huge source of stress for any family. Of course, we all need decent finances in order to best provide for young children.

They sit down with these families, figure out what is going wrong, teach them how to better deal with their money, how to make savings, how to do banking, how to efficiently run their financial affairs, and sometimes that helps families quite a lot; sometimes it even keeps them out of contact with the department and out of the child protection system, which of course we do not want more people coming into.

But this service also looks after children at the other end, those who have been in the state's care may be for a few years, maybe for several years, and helps them to develop the skills to be able to cope in the outside world and helps them to stand on their own two feet. The work that they are doing with children leaving care, helping children to transition from care, is so valuable. Looking at the budget you would think that, in terms of the financial counselling service, the princely sum of $1 million was being offered to a non-government organisation to run the same service. That is what it looks like when you look at the figures.

While that is not something I am a big fan of because the service itself we found out was costing about $4.6 million, so you are replacing a $4.6 million program with 59 FTEs with a $1 million budget, which would equate to about 10 FTEs. Anyway, regardless of that, we might have seen, if it was being outsourced, some skilled workers who currently have roles pick up similar jobs in the NGO system and provide an avenue for families and young people to be able to continue getting the support and advice they need as far as financial management goes.

Under estimates questioning, it became clear that that is actually not what is happening at all. The 59 FTE staff are losing their jobs, with no similar service replacing them. When asked what this $1 million was for, the minister and department officials revealed that an NGO or NGOs would get a portion of that money to top up services they already provide. There is not a like-for-like service and, in fact, that is exactly what they said: there is no like-for-like service.

When asked what services would be replacing the financial wellbeing program, the reply was a list of excellent programs, which the member for Port Adelaide would probably find quite familiar because they were all announced previously by her as part of the Labor government's comprehensive package of reforms in response to the Nyland royal commission. There was not anything new there. So we are cutting a service and then saying we are replacing it with something that actually already exists. The service is getting axed and replaced with things that are already there.

There was particular mention made of the value of the sortly app. This is a great app. It is one that the former minister actually commissioned. The CREATE Foundation, which works with children in state care, helped to develop this app based on a previous model. I have used it myself; I have checked it out. It is fantastic. You can get all sorts of information that young people need around things like health care, education and accessing jobs services—all really valuable stuff. There is even a little bit in there about financial services. But you know what? It is not a specialist financial services tool. It is certainly not the same as a young person seeing a financial counsellor and getting specific financial advice that suits their needs and someone sitting down and teaching them the skills that they need, not just to get through a transition period, but to live the rest of their lives.

When there was all this talk about this app and how it would replace the financial wellbeing program, I can understand that those 60-odd financial counsellors employed in the Department for Child Protection felt pretty ripped off that this government thinks that they, with their skills and experience, can be replaced by an app. It is offensive. What those financial counsellors find even more offensive and what they are really worried about are the scores of families—families who are in need, need a bit of help to get on top of their finances, and young people leaving care who need some assistance to learn the skills that they are going to need for life—who will not have access to a tailored guidance and support package. We should be investing in early intervention and prevention to help people stand on their own two feet, not cutting services such as this.

This budget also sees cuts to residential care. An amount of $3.9 million was slated for new residential care facilities, but those have now been scrapped. I accept the minister's explanation that she was not a fan of the type of accommodation that was planned. She could have built something else if she felt that that particular style of housing was not conducive to children's needs. Instead, the project has just gone. The money for it has gone, too.

No-one wants more children in residential care and I hope we do not even need the accommodation, because, as a society we are doing better in caring for our kids and we do not have as many kids coming into state care. That, of course, would be ideal. As I said earlier, we need to base decisions and budgets on reality. How the minister can make a decision to axe this facility is puzzling, when, as I discussed earlier, there is no modelling or accurate forecast of the number of children coming into care in the next year.

Certainly the minister has already conceded that the figure of 33 extra children coming into care in the next 12 months is wrong and that she expects it to be higher. Looking back on figures from previous years, the department certainly expects it to be higher. So why you would cut investment in residential care, or any sort of capital infrastructure for children who are going through this experience and for families who need support, is just beyond me. At the very least, the minister might have sought to divert that money into other forms of care—but that was not done.

This is a budget where promises simply were not delivered. We have heard a lot about this budget delivering on the promises of the Liberal government. In child protection, that is simply not true. This minister has put a lot of ideas out there in her time in opposition and some pretty interesting ones since then as well.

The minister was a great advocate, especially on FIVEaa, of a secure therapeutic care facility. She talked about it a lot. When I asked the minister where the money for it is in this budget, out she whipped the pre-prepared written-down speech, which in effect said, 'I'm not really progressing this. It's not really a priority.' It is a pretty stark difference from when she lobbied for this for years beforehand. It seems that the minister is backing away from this idea at a rate of knots, even though she was quite an advocate for it previously. It is not the only area in which she is doing that.

The minister was also a fan of the Public Service's 2up campaign. This is a campaign aiming to ensure there are always two workers on at a time in residential and commercial care facilities. The PSA put forward some very good reasons for it, including the safety of their members. We know that there are sometimes accusations and, in fact, sometimes offending against children, so there is an accountability and security aspect. They also put forward that people need to have safe and fair working conditions, and a 2up arrangement is a way of achieving that. The minister was a supporter of it, but where is the money for it? Nowhere. I am waiting for some questions on notice about staffing at residential care centres and I look forward to getting them but, quite simply, this is a project that is not going to occur.

Over the years, we have also heard a lot from this minister about early intervention and prevention, and we still hear about it. We still hear her and this government speak about the need for investment in early intervention and prevention, and I agree—this side of the house absolutely agrees—that we should be investing in early, mid and even late intervention projects and prevention projects to make sure that we do not have the sort of stress we are currently and have been experiencing for some time on our child protection system. When asked about where the money is for that in this budget, she says, 'It's nowhere. It's not in this budget. It's someone else's responsibility to look after that.'