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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-11-15 Daily Xml
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Child Protection

Mr TEAGUE (Heysen) (14:37): My question is to the Premier. Can the Premier explain to the house whether or not SAPOL officers will conduct rapid checks on children identified as being at high risk? If so, how are they equipped to do so and how long will that take?

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Premier) (14:38): Yes; in fact, the police commissioner and I have been in contact about this very issue including as recently as earlier today. As I outlined in our press conference when we announced the government was in receipt of both of those reports, SAPOL are coordinating an exercise to see approximately 500 children across the state being visited in order to check for any signs of child neglect.

To be a little bit more specific, that's approximately 400 unique addresses that need to be visited because there are some instances where there are siblings involved, so that's a very substantial undertaking. It is being coordinated by SAPOL, but the bulk of the work done on the ground won't be done by SAPOL; it will be done by a combination of the Department for Child Protection and also utilising resources from the Department of Human Services.

That process is sought to be done as expeditiously as possible. It is quite a substantial undertaking because of course there are existing functions that both those departments do on a daily basis at the frontline in an emergency context. Nonetheless, I think we will recognise the importance of this exercise, and that's why we are having SAPOL coordinate it.

In answer to the shadow minister's question, SAPOL are coordinating it. That doesn't mean that SAPOL can't make visits, and that may well yet happen, but the bulk of the volume of the work in terms of the actual visits to the home will be done by those two agencies.

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