House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2018-05-16 Daily Xml

Contents

Grandparents for Grandchildren SA

Ms STINSON (Badcoe) (14:57): Thank you, Mr Speaker. My question is to the Minister for Child Protection. Will the minister commit to providing funding to Grandparents for Grandchildren until the September budget?

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General) (14:57): I am not sure whether the member was actually listening to the previous answer but, if she wasn't, I will just perhaps identify this.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER Order! Ten minutes to go.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER Order!

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN: If any organisation—

The Hon. S.S. Marshall: Why did you go out to tender?

The SPEAKER: Premier!

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN: —feels—bearing in mind we are still in May, some of the new members might appreciate that obviously a number of agencies have their funding up until 30 June each year and about this time of the year they get a little bit unsettled. They are not quite sure what is going to be happening with their funding and they seek to have extra provision and the like.

So it is not unusual; it starts around about this time in May. Some feel that their issues or concerns have not been protected sufficiently as we pass 30 June. Even when budgets are published in the months May or June, as is more common when there is not an election—although, of course, the previous Labor government regularly had its budgets later in the year, throughout the 16 years that it was in office, but nevertheless there is a process. If an organisation or an agency or a unit or a department wishes to raise a concern in relation to the security of funding, if it is appropriate, then that is a matter to be presented to the Treasury office.