House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2016-09-21 Daily Xml

Contents

Child Protection

Mr MARSHALL (Dunstan—Leader of the Opposition) (14:24): Supplementary: if the minister is not aware of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare metric, what metric has the government used to benchmark its performance against other states?

The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Justice Reform, Minister for Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Child Protection Reform, Minister for the Public Sector, Minister for Consumer and Business Services, Minister for the City of Adelaide) (14:24): If you want to go on particular metrics, I can find out from the department exactly what metrics they use, and I can get back to the Leader of the Opposition. The point I am trying to convey is much simpler.

If the Leader of the Opposition thinks that quoting numbers which may or may not be correct and making comparisons which may or may not be valid is designed to prove that we have a problem with child protection services in South Australia, we acknowledge that the child protection services need improvement. That is not a matter of contest. That is why we have had a royal commission, which we called, to get to the bottom of what the issues were and try to improve things. That is what we intend to do.

Mr Bell interjecting:

The SPEAKER: I warn the member for Mount Gambier.