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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, First Session (53-1)
2014-09-24 Daily Xml
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Child Protection

Ms SANDERSON (Adelaide) (15:11): Supplementary. How can the government be certain that there are not other tier 2 reports of child neglect and abuse that warrant investigation but are not being followed up—for other children like Chloe and Ebony who are in the system?

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE (Wright—Minister for Education and Child Development) (15:11): No child protection system can investigate every notification that comes in, and I think I said yesterday we have something like 19,000 notifications. We have in excess of tens of thousands of calls but 19,000 that are screened in.

South Australia investigates more notifications than many of the other states. We certainly investigate more than Victoria, I think we investigate more than Tasmania, and the list goes on. You cannot do every one. Some of them, as I said, are multiple notifications and some of them are best addressed by engaging with other organisations. It is not supposed to be a punitive system. It is supposed to be about engaging with families. That is why we have invested in the many, many different support mechanisms that we have invested in.

For example, when we came into government, there were no universal contact visits. We now have every mother visited when she has a newborn child. There was no family home visiting program, which is a sustained home visiting program. We had no safe babies program. We had no children's centres here in South Australia and we now have 41 that run parenting programs and have appropriate programs for the communities that they look after.

There was no Strong Start program, there was no Guardian for Children and Young People, there was no Council for the Care of Children, there was no Child Death and Serious Injury Review Committee, and we had half the number of childcare and protection workers here in South Australia and I think we have trebled the budget since we have been in government. No-one can guarantee that every notification that is screened in will be investigated. It is just not possible.

The SPEAKER: Supplementary, member for Davenport.

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