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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-09-04 Daily Xml
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EDUCATION AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT

70 Mr GARDNER (Morialta) (10 April 2012).

1. Is the minister aware that a senior police officer made a report to SAPOL management in October 2011 that, upon reporting a child at risk of abuse to Families SA (as required under the Child Protection Act), he was told that the department had no resources available to deal with any new child protection cases for the next month?

2. Immediately after being informed of the death of a four month old baby in November 2011, did the minister instigate an internal review of what interaction her department had with this family and why a notification made by the Women's and Children's Hospital was not followed up and acted upon?

3. Is the minister satisfied on the information received on the way her department handled the intervention in the case of the death of the four month old baby?

The Hon. G. PORTOLESI (Hartley—Minister for Education and Child Development): I am not aware of any instances where a police officer has been advised that Families SA does not have the resources to deal with any new child protection cases for the next month.

It is worth noting that the Child Abuse Report Line does not make any decisions about managing workloads in Families SA Offices.

As a matter of routine with regard to the death of any child in South Australia, the police are contacted with the details of the matter and a referral is made to the Department's Adverse Events Program, Special Investigations Unit, the Child Death and Serious Injury Review Committee and/or the Coroner as appropriate.

I expect that as a result of these processes my department will provide me with details of any practice improvements that could have been made in any case.

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