House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2013-10-17 Daily Xml

Contents

CHILD PROTECTION

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (14:06): A supplementary question: this may also be a matter that the minister may wish to take on notice, but is the minister aware that Don Mackie wrote to the wrongly accused student on 16 February 2012 stating, 'What steps will now be taken is a matter for us. You have agreed not to take any further steps and that includes filing any further report with police.'

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE (Wright—Minister for Education and Child Development, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (14:06): Again, I am happy to take that on notice. I have had a look at some of the correspondence that has gone backwards and forwards. In the correspondence that was referred to yesterday was a letter from Mr Costello to this young person, and I have gone back and had a look at that correspondence.

I want to make the point that in that correspondence it referred to the fact that there would be a meeting between that young person, Don Mackie, and the regional director. The strong overtone of that letter was about focusing on the support and any direct costs that this young person had incurred.

I got the sense that what the department was really looking at was how it could compensate this young person for the lack of education that he had received and helping him to complete his SACE certificate. Now, we may question the agreement that was signed and some of the content of that, but I do think that perhaps for many of those people who were involved in the discussions with him, it was about providing him with some support to get his life back on track.

Mr Pisoni: A supplementary sir.