HANSARD
SITTING CALENDAR
SEARCH
LIVE BROADCAST
Hansard Dynamic Member Index
Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2013-07-24 Daily Xml
Contents
Pdf Xml

SELECT COMMITTEE ON DISABILITY SERVICES FUNDING

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (16:25): I move:

That the report of the committee be noted.

I rise to make some remarks in relation to this report, which I am very pleased we have been able to report on. At the outset I would like to particularly recognise the hardworking staff of our committee: Mr Guy Dickson; Mr Chris Neale, who has moved on to other pastures; and Ms Margie Morrison, our research officer. I would also like to recognise the other members of the committee: the Hon. Ann Bressington, the Hon. Gerry Kandelaars, the Hon. Ian Hunter, the Hon. Rob Lucas, the Hon. Kelly Vincent and the Hon. Russell Wortley.

The committee arose in light of concerns the Auditor-General raised in the report for the year ended 30 June, which was tabled in September 2010. The report raised some issues which are the subject of the reporting of this committee. The motion to refer this matter to a select committee was moved by myself on 10 November 2010 and received support from honourable members in this chamber on 24 November 2010.

The Auditor-General raised a number of concerns in relation to this particular matter, those being: the use of a non-government organisation to hold government funds, the absence of important information to aid decision making, incomplete financial reporting, the lack of documentation and formal conditions, and that payments were made in variance to a cabinet submission.

The details are that one-off funding was provided to the Julia Farr Association in June 2007 and June 2008 and, while it was used for its original purpose, that being to provide equipment for people with disabilities, the moneys allocated were not actually fully expended until March 2010, some almost three years later in the instance of the first tranche of money.

We received submissions and evidence from a number of organisations: the Auditor-General, obviously; the relevant department, which was previously the Department for Families and Communities and is currently the Department for Communities and Social Inclusion; the Office of the Public Advocate; and the Department of Treasury and Finance. We also received advice from non-government organisations: National Disability Services, the Julia Farr Association, Technical Aid to the Disabled, and from three individuals who had been previously engaged as government employees: Mr Peter Smith, Ms Anne Gale and Ms Victoria Purman.

The majority of submissions presented to the committee did not support the practice of providing one-off funding commitments for disability services; instead, they supported recurrent funding. Some of the community organisations expressed concerns to the committee about the process in choosing the Julia Farr Association to be the recipient of funds. There were also instances where the amounts of funding were changed Clearly that was of some concern to those organisations that had been slated to receive funding and then either they received less or did not receive any at all.

Despite the fact that we had received a lot of evidence about funding issues, what we were unable to determine was who made the recommendation that cabinet decisions be altered; who took that actual decision and what the rationale was for those changes of decisions. The additional one-off funding quantums ($2.92 million in June 2007 and $2.15 million in June 2008) were clearly paid in the final month of those financial years and were allocated specifically for disability equipment. This fund was paid directly to the Julia Farr Association, in spite of the fact that Julia Farr did not have a role in managing, prescribing or providing disability equipment. In the financial years 2007-08, 2008-09 and 2009-10 Julia Farr was invoiced for particular disability equipment and then provided those funds—which was an unusual arrangement.

The Auditor-General observed that the choice of the Julia Farr Association as a non-government organisation was to ensure that the department did not lose that funding before the end of the financial year, so it was effectively parked in those years. The Auditor-General described that practice as unusual, which is why the investigation was undertaken. Part of the evidence from the Auditor-General was that the intention was not to lose the funding, which Mr Andrew Richardson described to the committee in the following terms:

Well, no-one is trying to pocket this money or take advantage.

That was obviously a good thing. He continued:

But, hopefully, as our report says, we still found it not the right way to go about achieving that end.

The choice of Julia Farr was explained to us by Dr David Caudrey, who is the Executive Director, Disability, Ageing & Carers Branch and who I note recently received a gong in the Queen's Birthday awards which he richly deserved as a former colleague and well respected in the disability community. He was unable to specify who had personally advised him that the one-off money was available but he made the comments—given the lapse of time—that it may well have been a number of different sources, whether it was the deputy chief executive above him who he reported to directly, the minister's office or the minister's adviser but, as he put it, it was 'in the wind'.

He also said that at all times he carries a wish list of items if money was available and could be spent because he said that he would hate to be in the position of being asked if there was money available that could be expended and not have an answer as to how that could be provided to people with disabilities. In the evidence Dr Caudrey was asked why Julia Farr was chosen, and he said:

We weren't in a position to give the money to a government agency because to give it to a government agency means that it is not really alienated from government and it is not a form of a non-recourse grant and it kind of folds into next year's budget when it is actually spent.

He asks himself: what is the best non-government adult agency that could provide this service so that we could get—in that case I think it was nearly $3 million in the first year and just over $2 million in the second—which agency could be used in order to be able to pay to get that money for that purpose? He goes on to state:

Julia Farr, really at that moment, happened to have a history, through Julia Farr Services...Over many years, Julia Farr Services, which is a government entity, had been a provider of equipment to its own clients...So, I thought and recommended that Julia Farr Association was probably the best bet in the sense that it had only recently been in this business. It was used to dealing with trust funds because it had dealt with the Residents Benefit Fund and so on—

So that seemed to provide some information in terms of why Julia Farr was chosen.

In relation to the non-recourse grant, which really is a form of grant that is unusual and means that, once it is transferred, the government has no means of forcing that organisation to pay it back, Dr Caudrey said:

I can't quite remember who gave me the concept of the non-recourse grant. They have been around, these types of things, for an awful long time.

We heard evidence from Mr Peter Smith, the former deputy chief executive, who said that he was not directly involved in these decisions, which was not an unusual thing for many of the witnesses to say. His comments in relation to the choice to park the funds with Julia Farr were:

I think the motive was the correct one. I understand this committee's concerns about the process. I would have said to David—

that being Dr Caudrey—

'Can you liaise with the minister's office on this?'

I believe what happened is that the cabinet submission was put together across government, essentially by Treasury. I certainly don't recall seeing the cabinet submission.

In further questioning, Mr Lucas asked him:

Was it him, you or both who advised the minister, and Victoria Purman—

who was the minister's adviser—

'This is the mechanism to get this money.'

Mr SMITH: We both understood that it was a non-recourse grant. I would have asked David to liaise with Victoria on what she needed to support that cabinet bid.

Mr Smith, who I understand has come to South Australia from interstate, found the practice of non-recourse grants 'peculiar', which I think was the word he used, and was somewhat bemused at the practice. We certainly heard from the Auditor-General that, as they went through their investigation, 'no-one could tell us the whole story'. For example, the investigations uncovered a detailed cabinet submission, but the auditors were unable to find any background information to support the submission, and this was a recurring theme. The Auditor-General told the committee:

...we felt that that submission was lacking in the respect that it didn't explain the context of Julia Farr's role as, apparently, a holder of funds. That was certainly the title we described that under and we found that not to be a good way of going about funding that program. That was the criticism that we made there.

The Auditor-General in evidence to us also spoke about accountability principles to be followed with these matters. I quote:

I think that there was this important principle here: that, for a well-intentioned purpose and outcome, one just does not provide funds but one has to provide the appropriate mechanisms for the efficient and effective use of those funds...Those mechanisms have to be provided, and they were provided—in the third cabinet submission, but not in the initial two.

The Department of Treasury and Finance in their evidence described non-recourse grants as not being as common as they were in the past and that they were relatively unusual. I understand from their evidence that this practice is certainly not as prevalent as it may have been in times past.

One of the other matters we considered was the appropriateness of the use of one-off funding, and the regular evidence was that the problem with one-off funding is that there is usually a delay in providing those funds to clients because you do not have the established mechanisms, that is, the relevant professionals to assess people for their particular needs. It is like trying to find that infrastructure and then that infrastructure is only required for a one-off purpose, so that can be quite difficult to engage people on that sort of basis.

Clearly, that was something quite unsatisfactory, but we note that the establishment of DisabilityCare Australia, while it is still some years off for many disability clients, will actually provide a lot of that funding for people with disabilities on an ongoing basis and at the sort of quantum that has probably been beyond most states to provide.

The Disability Services Trust Fund was an issue that had arisen from the Public Advocate's annual report, and I think that matter has been dealt with, so it is probably not something we need to speak about in detail. We also talked about the matter of rights-based funding and the fact that the current Disability Services Act is quite some years old and in need of a revamp. The findings of the committee were as follows:

Based on the evidence of the Auditor-General, the disbursement of funds may have breached Treasurer's Instructions 2 and 8.

The use of a non-recourse grant to a non-government organisation for the purposes of depositing funds was irregular. It placed government funds at risk because the NGO [non-government organisation] was under no obligation to acquit the funds for the purpose for which they were intended. No funding agreement was signed between the Department of Families and Communities and the Julia Farr Association to ensure that the funding would be expended for the purpose for which it was intended.

No explanation was able to be provided as to the reason for variations of up to $640,000 in one-off grants to various disability organisations between the 2008 cabinet submission and the actual payments. This decision was probably made by the then Minister for Disability, the Hon. Jay Weatherill.

The office of the then Minister was involved in the decision to provide funds in this matter, but no individual (including the then Minister) has admitted involvement.

On that point, this matter had been raised in parliament prior to the establishment of the committee. The then shadow minister, the member for Bragg (Vickie Chapman) had asked questions of the Hon. Jay Weatherill, the minister on whose watch this took place, and the minister at the time, the Hon. Jennifer Rankine. The answers they provided in parliament were unsatisfactory, which is why it was determined to pursue this committee.

At one point our committee wrote to the Hon. Jay Weatherill to seek further information, and he merely referred us to his statement in parliament. So, some documentation clearly has gone missing, which seems to be a theme for his administration. Further findings include:

The office of the then Minister was involved in the decision to provide funds in this manner, but no individual (including the then Minister) has admitted involvement.

The Auditor-General's own audit team was unable to determine how the details of the cabinet submission supporting the original funding proposal was created. Two of the three cabinet submissions lacked appropriate mechanisms for the efficient and effective use of the funds.

The funds were eventually expended on the purpose for which they were allocated, that is, for the purpose of disability equipment.

We made a series of recommendations based on a lot of the issues raised in the committee. With those words, I endorse the report and look forward to further contributions on this matter.

The Hon. G.A. KANDELAARS (16:43): It will not surprise members if I said that this committee had been set up as a political witch-hunt from the start, which I must say is nothing new for select committees in this place. It has produced no evidence of any import to suit the opposition's political motivations.

The Auditor-General's Report 2009-10 made an observation and comment in relation to the payments made to Julia Farr Association (JFA) in June 2007, of $2.92 million, and June 2008, of $2.15 million. The key issue that needs to be considered by all who have an interest in this is the following: the Auditor-General's Report made no recommendations about the government funding process in the future, and it clearly identifies that the former department of families and communities (DFC) was not using a grant type prohibited either by the Treasurer or the Auditor-General. The report says:

As outlined in the Auditor-General's report, the money was paid directly to the organisation, however, the JFA did not play a role in managing, prescribing or providing disability equipment. During the 2007-08, 2008-09 and 2009-10 financial years, JFA was invoiced to recoup the grant monies and recover the costs of disability equipment that the Department ordered and purchased.

The issue at hand was the process used by the department to expend the moneys allocated to meet unmet demand for disability equipment—that was and is the crux of the issue. No criticism should be directed to the Julia Farr Association in its involvement in the use of non-recourse grant processes.

The Julia Farr Association was not the only recipient of funds for equipment but had a specific interest in equipment needs for adults with physical and neurological disabilities. The grant payments at the centre of this committee's investigation were part of a number of approved grants to non-government organisations for the purchase of disability equipment.

In his report, the Auditor-General acknowledged the intent of the former department for families and communities in administering the funding: it was to ensure that the unspent funds were still available for the purchase of much-needed client disability equipment. Importantly, non-recourse grants such as this are permissible under Treasurer's Instructions and allowed for by the Auditor-General. In fact, I believe the Hon. Rob Lucas, when he was treasurer, did approve non-recourse grants—maybe he can deny that.

The finding that, somehow, the use of non-recourse grants to non-government organisations was irregular and placed government grants at risk is arrant nonsense and an insult to all the NGOs in the disability sector—arrant nonsense. I note that:

The Auditor-General advised the Committee that he was not against non-recourse grants. He noted that non-government organisations are diligent when using government funds.

Yes, they are diligent. The Auditor-General supported the intent of DFC to supply much-needed equipment to people with disabilities and indicates there was no inappropriate use of the funds in question. In fact, in the case of the Julia Farr Association, all the funds were acquitted to the last cent.

The Auditor-General did state, however, that there was an issue with the process through which the funds were allocated and, yes, there were a few issues in respect of the process. As I understand, the process issue that the Auditor-General was critical of did not affect the end result, which was and is that people most in need of funds got the funding. This seems to be lost on the opposition member's pitchfork carriers.

At the time these events transpired, additional GST funding became available to be allocated by the department, and the window of opportunity to use that funding can close very quickly if not acted upon. This occurred in the late 2007 and 2008 financial years and, with great credit, the officers of the former department for families and child development, with the support of their then minister (the Hon. Jay Weatherill), secured the total funding that was made available to address a gap in the unmet need for disability equipment.

I am advised that in that limited time available to them (before this window of opportunity closed), they identified a list of recipients the funding could be allocated to. When the funding block was secured, they then revisited the list of recipients they initially identified to secure the funding. Believe it or not, this is what the select committee spent nearly three years investigating. Yes, that process was not word perfect, but it was in no way a process which amounted to anything which could be considered misconduct or misappropriation. As I said in my dissenting statement:

The then Minister for the Department for Families and Communities, now Premier Jay Weatherill, must be commended for his advocacy on behalf of the disability sector to help to address the unmet need for disability equipment. Largely as a result of the Premier's work, two additional allocations of one-off funding to meet the unmet need...was essentially addressed.

The Premier deserves to be recognised for addressing that unmet demand for disability equipment, which these two additional pieces of funding provided. The government he leads has a proven ongoing commitment to the disability sector in South Australia. This is best observed by the government's most recent funding allocations in the state budget.

The budget includes a number of new services and extra funding, which will boost the level of equality in our community and ease the burden on people living with a disability. This includes an extra $108 million for disability services, continuing the government's commitment to improving the life of people with disabilities. This follow last year's commitment of $212.5 million, which was the single biggest investment in disability services in this state's history.

The Premier and the government he leads have an ongoing commitment to the disability sector in South Australia, which was also demonstrated by the government's commitment to the National Disability Insurance Scheme (now known as DisabilityCare), to which South Australia was one of the first states to sign up and to which South Australia is actively involved in the current trial. DisabilityCare will greatly benefit those in our community living with a disability, their families and carers.

It is a great pity to see the opposition trying to take cheap shots at the government on this issue. It is a pity that it has nothing really concrete to say when it comes to disability policy broadly. It would be nice to actually see a policy, but history has shown us that policy from this opposition is like rain in the Sahara—I am sure it has happened, but it was a long time ago; nobody can remember when. What else can I say?

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS (16:53): This committee was established, as members have indicated, in late 2010, and it has finally reported this week. As the Hon. Ms Lensink has indicated, the final members of the committee were Ms Lensink, myself, Ms Bressington, Ms Vincent and Mr Kandelaars.

I will respond to some of the comments of the Hon. Mr Kandelaars later in my contribution, but the only thing I think I can agree with in relation to the Hon. Mr Kandelaars' closed-eye contribution to the debate is that, nowhere in this report, no member should in any way infer or impute any criticism of the Julia Farr Association in relation to its involvement in what was a significant criticism by the Auditor-General of the government and the minister's processes in relation to this. Certainly, on that I think we can have common ground in terms of not wishing to involve the good name of the Julia Farr Association in relation to any criticisms.

The other point I want to make at the outset—and I think this was missed by the contribution from the Hon. Mr Kandelaars—is that there are significant concerns not just about the process in relation to this but about the impact in terms of the delivery of the service. We can all agree that additional funding, whether it be recurrent or one-off, for disability services—in this case disability equipment—is a good thing. The organisations obviously prefer recurrent funding, but I am sure they would concede that at least one-off funding is better than no funding at all.

The concerns that need to be put on the record are that a number of significant organisations which were meant to receive funding either had significant funding cut (and I will refer to that later) or did not receive funding at all, even though cabinet had approved it. Therefore, the clients who were serviced by those particular organisations were disadvantaged in terms of getting access to disability equipment. Secondly, the very significant delays of this particular process that the minister and the department were involved in meant that clearly the delivery of services from the $5 million that we are talking about were significantly delayed, when compared with a process of direct delivery and service through the appropriate government department.

The evidence the committee took was that, whilst the original grants were approved in June 2007 and June 2008, the final payments out of the $5 million were not made until 2½ years later, in March 2010. What we have is the convoluted process of using Julia Farr Association as an agency to stash the cash within. That complicated process meant in part—it was not solely due to that—a significant delay in the delivery of services to the disability community or to those people who needed disability equipment during that particular time.

Whilst there are significant criticisms of the processes the minister and the government adopted, people should not forget that the real import of the committee's work is to try to get to the bottom of how people with disabilities and in need of disability equipment were disadvantaged by the process that the minister and the government adopted. I think too often members can miss the importance of that particular issue in this debate whilst just solely concentrating on the process.

I will refer to the statements from the then minister, minister Weatherill, later on in my contribution. He boasts that this was his idea. He got cabinet to approve it, and he implemented the scheme, so he is not shying away from the fact that this was all his idea, to use his words. Put very simply, this particular process that was Mr Weatherill's idea, the former minister's idea, was a scheme, based on deception and misinformation, deliberately designed to subvert the processes demanded by Treasury in terms of proper financial management. That is it in a nutshell.

What occurred was that in June 2007 and June 2008, just before the end of the financial year—not uncommon—Treasury decided that it had unspent funds, and it said to various agencies: 'Whoever can actually spend this money before 30 June, put in a submission because we want to get it off our books in terms of what deficit or surplus we report for this financial year compared with the following financial year.'

So, if you could not spend the money before 30 June there was no point in actually putting your submission into cabinet. The sums of money were approximately $2.9 million in June 2007 and $2.1 million in June 2008, a total of $5 million. The decision was taken to stash this cash in the Julia Farr Association. The reason for that was that in order to comply with the demands of Treasury you had to actually get the money out of the department before 30 June; if you could not do that, some other department would get the money.

What they had to come up with was a scheme to subvert the normal processes in terms of proper financial management. So, what they did was find a willing partner, the Julia Farr Association, which received the $5 million in two tranches and then, over a 2½ year period, the department invoiced against that $5 million appropriation.

This process received significant criticism—as members have noted from the Auditor-General's Report—from various community organisations (and we saw that in some of our evidence) and, of course, by a number of non-government members of parliament, including Liberal members at the time. It was pursued in the parliament, but unsatisfactory responses were given and, ultimately, this parliament—by a significant number, I think—established a select committee to look at the issue.

In simple terms, the select committee evidence has found that former minister Weatherill is guilty of similar offences to those which he and this particular government pursued the former chief executive officer of the justice department over. That was an issue in relation to stashing cash. It was not an issue of misappropriation for personal benefit; it was an endeavour by the CEO to put money into an account, albeit still within government. Maybe Kate Lennon's mistake was not to find the Julia Farr Association to put the money into, which is what then minister Weatherill did. Kate Lennon put money into the Crown Solicitor's Trust Account to use in subsequent years for worthy projects within the agency, projects that would be approved either by the department or the minister, according to delegated authority.

I do not want to revisit all the detail of those issues, but I will say that the government, former minister Weatherill and others, persecuted and pursued Kate Lennon in relation to criticism of that. The former auditor-general and the government accused Kate Lennon of breaching Treasurer's Instructions, and the former auditor-general gave evidence in relation to the seriousness of breaching Treasurer's Instructions. He indicated that in some circumstances it was, in his view, tantamount to a criminal offence. As a result of that, Kate Lennon was no longer the chief executive of any government department.

They are the similar offences that that former minister Weatherill is now found guilty of. This $5 million was stashed in the Julia Farr Association. As I said, it was spent over a 2½ year period, but the deliberate deception I refer to was made clear by the evidence of the then auditor-general when he said that former minister Weatherill's submission to cabinet did not make any reference to this critical issue of stashing the cash in the Julia Farr Association. That is an extraordinary piece of evidence from the Auditor-General. Let me refer to the committee's report. On the issue of the amount of information contained in cabinet submissions, the Auditor-General told the committee:

...we felt that the submission was lacking in the respect that it didn't explain the context of Julia Farr's role as, apparently, a holder of funds. That was certainly the title we described that under and we found that not to be a good way of going about funding that program. That was the criticism that we made there.

That is the Auditor-General making it quite clear that the cabinet submission did not include the absolutely critical fact that this cash was going to be stashed in a non-government organisation for a period of 2½ years to get around the normal Treasury processes.

Even more extraordinary was the evidence given by some of the very senior executives of the department. The executive director of financial services, the chief financial boffin, in the former department for families and communities told the committee that he first became aware that Julia Farr Association did not deliver disability equipment programs when he received correspondence from the Auditor-General in August and September of 2009. This is the executive director of financial services. He did not believe that there were officers working in finance who were aware that the money was allocated to Julia Farr Association and would be recovered by the department.

How more damning can you be of a minister and a department in terms of their processes? The head financial person in the department said that not only didn't he know but he didn't believe anyone in the finance department knew what minister Weatherill had done and approved, because cabinet was not told about it, that Julia Farr Association was going to be the agency where the cash was stashed. Also, as I said, the executive director said that he did not even realise that Julia Farr Association did not actually deliver disability equipment programs, that they weren't going to deliver the program, they were just going to be used as a stashed cash repository.

Clearly, the finance people when they saw Julia Farr Association there believed that they were an agency that was going to deliver disability equipment programs together with the other agencies that were listed. That is a damning criticism of this particular process that had been approved by the former minister. Not only didn't the minister not tell cabinet at the time, clearly cabinet was not aware of it for the period afterwards.

The Auditor-General also in his evidence to the committee indicated that the process may have, to use his phrase, breached Treasurer's Instructions 2 and 8. As I said, these were the similar criticisms that were made of Kate Lennon on an earlier occasion, that there had been breaches of Treasurer's Instructions, in particular 2 and 8 and some other Treasurer's Instructions. As I said, the former auditor-general underlined the seriousness of breaches of Treasurer's Instructions, so what we have here is an auditor-general giving evidence to a committee that for the current Premier, the former minister, the process that was his idea may well have breached important Treasurer's Instructions in terms of financial management and accountability.

The major issue that I want to address in my contribution today is the significant discrepancy between what cabinet approved and what eventually occurred and in the end who was responsible for that breach of cabinet decision-making processes. That is covered in the committee's report from page 14 to approximately page 17. Page 14 of the committee's report highlights a number of organisations but I refer to three in particular. It states that in May 2008, cabinet approved $640,000 for the Guide Dogs Association for disability equipment. In the end—or straight after that—the decision that minister Weatherill implemented was contrary to the cabinet decision and he allocated zero dollars to the Guide Dogs. So cabinet approved $640,000; minister Weatherill breached the cabinet decision and allocated zero dollars to the Guide Dogs. So they missed out on $640,000.

Technical Aid to the Disabled, another wonderful group providing assistance to the disability community, was allocated $100,000 in the cabinet submission. Minister Weatherill breached that cabinet approval and decision and gave the organisation zero, zip, nothing. It did not get a dollar. It missed out on the $100,000 that cabinet had approved in May 2008.

Finally, cabinet approved $640,000 for another wonderful organisation, Can:Do 4Kids. Minister Weatherill breached that cabinet decision and allocated $200,000 for Can:Do 4Kids, a cut or reduction of $440,000 for that organisation.

In my contribution I constantly remind members that, whilst the processes are important, let us not forget the impact on the people who are meant to receive the assistance. I refer members to pages 16 and 17 of the committee's report, to the evidence from Technical Aid to the Disabled. Remember, cabinet said that they should get $100,000. For whatever reason, minister Weatherill breached that cabinet decision and gave them nothing. They came and gave evidence to the committee. They told the committee that they were 'surprised to say the least when we saw a report in The Advertiser on 16 April 2011 stating that TADSA had a $100,000 shortfall, as indicated to this committee by the Auditor-General' according to the article and the evidence. The report states:

This claim was particularly concerning for the organisation because 'had there been this funding available at the time, it would have made a substantial difference to [their] future planning'

The committee was interested to know how an organisation like Technical Aid to the Disabled may have spent an additional $100,000. It was told, 'I suppose it would have enabled us to continue the way we are.' They went on to say:

In hindsight, it would perhaps have got us through the traumas of the financial situation and it would be perhaps not until next year that we would be going to the government to say, 'Can we get more money? Can we have some more support? Then maybe things would have been better.

They gave considerable evidence in relation to the impact of the decision by minister Weatherill to breach the cabinet decision to give them $100,000. The organisation said that the first thing they knew about cabinet approving $100,000 to them back in May 2008 was almost three years later, in April 2011, when evidence from the Auditor-General to this committee indicated that that was the cabinet decision and they had missed out.

As I said, I listened to the closed-eye approach of the Hon. Mr Kandelaars to this particular committee. He dismisses it as a political witch-hunt. Sadly, the Hon. Mr Kandelaars closes his eyes to the impact of the decision of his government, his current Premier, the former minister, on organisations such as Technical Aid to the Disabled, the Guide Dogs and Can:Do 4Kids, organisations that were approved by cabinet to get significant sums of money and, for whatever reason, minister Weatherill breached those cabinet decisions. Let's not be led astray by the plaintive cries of the Hon. Mr Kandelaars on behalf of the current Premier and the government in terms of this particular report.

What I do want to highlight is that, in the dissenting statement from the Hon. Mr Kandelaars, he very cleverly but very clearly does not defend the current Premier in relation to the breaching of the cabinet decision issue. If you read his dissenting statement of some three pages, he does not touch that particular issue at all; he does not defend the current Premier.

What he does say, and what we all acknowledge is that the Premier should be congratulated, as should the former government, in finding one-off funding to provide disability equipment. No-one is disagreeing with that issue; that can be common ground for everybody in the parliament. However, I advise members and particularly his caucus colleagues to have a close look at that very concisely drafted dissenting statement where he makes no defence at all—not one word, not one reference—to the breaching of the cabinet decision by minister Weatherill in relation to these organisations.

I suspect the reason why is that there really is no defence. Not even the closed-eye approach from the Hon. Mr Kandelaars for the rest of his contribution could come up with any defence as to how, if a cabinet decision is made, a department and a minister can implement a completely different decision.

Can I say at the outset, having had some experience with cabinet processes, that it is rare—but it has certainly happened—where if a cabinet decision is taken and for whatever reason a department and the minister come back and say, 'Look, on reflection, that wasn't the best decision; we need to change it,' that another cabinet submission will go back to override the first cabinet decision. As I said, it is a rare but it has happened and I am sure it will continue to happen and will happen in the future—where a cabinet decision is changed—and that is the appropriate process.

However, if cabinet has approved a certain level of funding for the Technical Aid for the Disabled, Guide Dogs and Can:Do 4Kids, it is not within the authority of the minister or within the authority of the department to change that. Let me say that everyone in the department denied that they had any involvement at all; they gave evidence, the minister did not. They gave evidence and said, 'Hey, we didn't have any involvement. All we were aware of was that minister Weatherill was having discussions with the Treasurer and then a press release came out and the press release was different to the cabinet decision.'

I think there are some obvious questions which this committee has recommended, that a department, if it is aware of a cabinet decision and then sees a press release or something else in terms of allocating money contrary to the cabinet decision, somebody should have the wherewithal or the guts or whatever it is to say to a chief executive and to a minister, 'Hey, cabinet approved this and you're actually not giving money in accordance with the cabinet approval; someone needs to go back and change the cabinet decision—if you want to—or we need to sort out what the process is going to be.'

However, the evidence to the committee from everyone, from former chief executives, finance people and others is that they either did not know about it or they had no recollection or they certainly did not do anything in relation to changing it. No-one within the department said that it was their decision to change the allocations. The only pointers given to the committee were, in essence, that the former minister (Mr Weatherill) was having discussions with the Treasurer and then, soon after that, a press release was issued which was different to the cabinet decision. That is why the committee found that the decision, in our view, was taken by the former minister.

Even the minister's disability adviser, Victoria Purman, who was the person within the minister's office in relation to disability issues—the department acknowledged that—said she had no knowledge of the change or who had changed it, and certainly indicated that she had not been involved in any decision to change it. Everyone in the department said they did not do it. The minister's disability adviser said she did not do it. The only person left, other than the receptionist, is the former minister for disability, and that is Mr Weatherill. That is why the committee found that it must have been the minister.

I think the committee was supported in that particular conclusion by the minister's approach to this issue and to the committee. The minister was written to by the committee saying, 'Here are the terms of reference.' The letter on 10 May 2012 said:

In evidence to the Committee on 15 April 2011, the Auditor-General noted that the actual amounts of funding paid to various organisations was not as had been approved by Cabinet in May 2008. Specifically, the Auditor-General noted that the following organisations received less funding than Cabinet had approved:

Then those organisations are listed.

The Auditor-General stated that the Department for Families and Communities could not explain why the actual amounts paid to non-Government organisations differed from that approved by Cabinet but did correspond to the amounts announced in the Premier's media release dated 22 May 2008.

The Auditor-General noted that the only information that the Department for Families and Communities could provide was as follows:

'In discussions with the former Minister through the period of time, the agency was aware that the Minister was continuing to have discussions with the Treasurer and other cabinet colleagues in relation to the disbursement of funding to NGOs.'

I interpose there to say that that is consistent with the evidence the department gave. They pointed the finger at the minister without actually being able to say definitely that it was the minister. Then the letter says:

In subsequent evidence to the Committee, a number of senior public servants and your former Disability Advisor, Ms Victoria Purman, were unable to give an explanation as to why these NGOs did not receive the funding approved in 2008.

Given your pivotal role at the time in this issue, the Committee seeks your assistance in explaining why these NGOs did not receive the levels of funding as approved by Cabinet in May 2008.

The Committee thanks you for your anticipated assistance.

The now Premier (the former minister) wrote to the committee. It is hard to read the date, but it looks like it is May 2012. He says:

Thank you for your letter of 10 May 2012 seeking my assistance in relation to a matter being enquired into by the Select Committee on Disability Services Funding.

I draw your attention to the remarks made by me in the Parliament about these matters on 27 October 2010. Please find the Hansard enclosed.

I hope you find this of assistance. I'm afraid I am unable to provide any further assistance to you.

Let us look at the answers that the minister says give the answer and there is no further response required. The minister's response on that particular day in 2010 is in full:

I will answer this question to the best of my recollection because, of course, I am no longer the minister for disability and do not have access to the present arrangements. To understand the trickiness of the question, implied in the question is some reference to the fact that it is at variance with cabinet approvals.

I will stop there. So, the minister (the now Premier) accuses the member for Bragg of being tricky by inferring that there had been some decisions taken at variance with cabinet approvals. The 'at variance with cabinet approvals' is established as a matter of fact by this committee. That is, the Auditor-General has confirmed that those three organisations—Technical Aids for the Disabled, Can:Do 4Kids and Guide Dogs—received either no money or significantly less money than cabinet had approved.

The minister was seeking to lead the House of Assembly to believe that this was a tricky question (deceptive) because it was inferring that decisions had been taken at variance with cabinet approvals. I am afraid that what is revealed is the trickiness and deceptiveness of the now Premier's response to that particular question. Mr Weatherill's response goes on as follows:

That was a particular component of what the Auditor-General found about the precise sums—that is the $5 million-odd that was decided by cabinet to be applied to disability equipment—in that there was some variation as to which non-government association got it. The overall sum that cabinet decided should go to disability equipment was spent on disability equipment. There was some adjustment of some very small amounts between the various disability organisations. What the member sought to do in her question was to suggest that somehow that minor matter was a major matter and that somehow cabinet did not approve it.

That is just extraordinary! What the minister's reply to the House of Assembly indicated was that there had only been adjustments of some very small amounts between the disability organisations. I remind members that Guide Dogs for the Blind lost or had cut $640,000, CanDo4Kids had their approval cut by $440,000, and Technical Aides for the Disabled had a loss or cut of $100,000. Premier Weatherill is telling the House of Assembly that a change of $640,000 to the Guide Dogs and other six-figure amounts to those other two organisations is, in the Premier's words, 'adjustment of some very small amounts between the various disability organisations'.

I am sure that even you, Mr President, when you retire out of that chair, would have to concede that that is misleading in terms of what is a very small amount. Nobody in the community would accept that an adjustment of $640,000, $440,000 or $100,000 is an adjustment of some very small amount between the various disability organisations. That is deception, trickiness in the extreme, in terms of the actual facts of the matter. The Premier then went on to say that somehow the member for Bragg was suggesting that a minor matter was a major matter, and that somehow cabinet did not approve it.

The member for Bragg was 100 per cent correct: cabinet had not approved it. Contrary to the assertion of the now Premier, cabinet had not approved that particular issue. We gave the now Premier the opportunity in the letter to explain why these NGOs did not receive the levels of funding as approved by cabinet in May 2008. It was an explicit question put in writing to the Premier and he could have corresponded to say, 'Look, I went back to cabinet and got another approval,' or whatever. The reason he could not was that he did not because these decisions were taken contrary to the cabinet approval. To conclude the Premier's response:

This is the standard that we have come to expect from those opposite. They come in here seeking to impugn the integrity of ministers of this government on the basis of misleading the house.

It is clear who has misled the house. The Premier accuses the member for Bragg and the opposition; clearly, the evidence before this committee indicates that it is the Premier who has misled the House of Assembly. The Premier continues:

If those are the standards that you wish to go by, you'll have to live with those standards.

He then concludes:

I can tell you that I promoted this idea, cabinet approved this idea and it was implemented. This money went to Disability Services—precisely where it was meant to go.

In concluding, the evidence presented to this committee, sadly, is a damning indictment of the former minister and the now Premier. As I indicated at the outset of my comments, he has boasted and claimed credit for a scheme which he has developed, which was based on deception and misinformation and which was deliberately designed to subvert the processes demanded by Treasury for proper financial management.

His idea, as the Auditor-General has concluded, probably breached Treasurer's Instructions 2 and 8. His idea included never advising cabinet of the use of Julia Farr Association for stashing cash. His idea has led to the cutting of funds to organisations, without cabinet approval, and the delay in the delivery of essential equipment services over a 2½ year period to people who critically needed the delivery of those funds, which had been allocated in May/June of 2007 and May/June of 2008 and which were not eventually expended until 2½ years later, in March of 2010.

Sadly, this sloppy and incompetent management approach by former minister Weatherill in relation to this particular issue has also been highlighted in other areas in recent weeks and months in terms of that minister's handling of the former department for education in relation to the scandalous and controversial child abuse issues within the department.

Sadly, it is a record that members in this chamber, like the Hon. Mr Kandelaars, are prepared to stand up and at least defend in part. Certainly, in my view the committee's report is a damning indictment of the management performance of the former minister in relation to this particular issue, and he deserves all the criticism that he will attract as a result of the committee's report.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. Carmel Zollo.

PARLIAMENTARY BUSINESS
MEMBERS
GET INVOLVED
ABOUT PARLIAMENT
VISIT
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL
HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY
CONTACT