Grievance Debate

Minister for Child Protection

Ms HILDYARD (Reynell) (15:12): I rise today to condemn, in the strongest possible terms, the Minister for Child Protection's abject and utter failure in relation to her handling of the abuse and pregnancy of two 13-year-old girls in state care. Every time I think of what those girls went through, I feel ill. Every time I think of the minister's complete obliviousness to their plight, like many others in our community, not only do I feel ill but I feel really, really angry.

When I listen, as we have had to today, to our Premier and our Deputy Premier protecting her obliviousness, that anger absolutely turns to fury. Our community and, so crucially importantly those girls in care—every child in care—deserve so much better. Following today's release of the damning Rice review by former District Court Judge Paul Rice, Minister Sanderson must step down or immediately be sacked. This independent review found the minister oversaw 'a significant failure regarding her handling of two sexual abuse cases'.

This review was launched late last year after the minister admitted that she was totally unaware of two cases of pregnant 13 year olds in state care who were sexually abused by paedophiles and, unbelievably, the second girl being enabled to live with a paedophile for two months. This is despite the fact that the minister publicly claimed she had changed reporting procedures after the first case emerged to ensure that she would be told. The fact is clear: the Rice review found that, despite the minister's public statements that she would be informed of serious sexual abuse, she has not actually issued this instruction to her own department. Judge Rice states:

It was crucial for the Minister to tell the Department that she wanted to know about the serious sexual abuse of children under guardianship. This was a significant failure on the Minister's part.

Judge Rice also found differences between the accounts of child protection department chief executive Cathy Taylor's evidence and the minister's, specifically in relation to a meeting the two held in September 2020. The minister told Judge Rice that she 'gave specific instructions to the chief executive that she was to be told in advance of sentencing' of serious sexual assaults. However, Judge Rice reports:

It seemed that the Chief Executive may have had a different memory of the meeting than the Minister.

He found:

It seemed to me that there was an ambiguity or an uncertainty about what was agreed at the meeting.

In 2018, Premier Marshall issued clear instructions to his ministers:

I have told my ministers that they cannot expect to remain in cabinet if they see nothing, hear nothing and question nothing.

Ministers have to be inquisitive, inquiring and challenging.

Responsibility ends on the minister's desk, not at the departmental door.

This independent inquiry clearly states in black and white that Rachel Sanderson failed. This was not just a minor failure. In Paul Rice's own words, it was a significant failure. The Premier has absolutely no choice. If he is to be true to his words in 2018 about ministerial accountability, about inquisitiveness and about taking responsibility, he must immediately sack the Minister for Child Protection.

It is beyond belief that the minister has made repeated public statements that she would be informed about sexual assaults when she never issued those instructions to her department. This minister is clearly out of her depth, and for the sake of children in care, children who need and deserve so much better, who deserve to be kept safe, she must be immediately replaced.

These latest issues come in the wake of a host of other failings in child protection under this minister's watch, failings that this government refused to investigate in the review. In fact, Judge Rice says, 'It is important to note the limitations of this inquiry.' Budget estimates reveal skyrocketing numbers of children in care and 14½ thousand calls to the Child Abuse Report Line unanswered. Instead of doing what she can to prevent family breakdown, the minister has outsourced the Therapeutic Reunification Service. South Australian children in care deserve so much better. This minister has to go for their sake.

Time expired.