Child Protection Screening

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (15:00): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills questions about unemployment and police clearances.

Leave granted.

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS: As the minister would be aware, there are a number of professions in this state which require the various forms of police or child protection screenings to examine the criminal history of individuals prior to licensing or registration, and they directly affect their employment. These are in the areas and industries of child care and teaching, health professionals, police and corrections staff, government workers, real estate agents and land agents, etc., financial services professionals, gaming licence holders, certain managerial personnel, second-hand dealers, liquor sellers and pawnbrokers and, most notably, public passenger services, such as bus drivers and, in this instance, taxi drivers.

My office—and, I understand, the offices of at least six other members of this parliament—was contacted approximately four weeks ago by a particular constituent who is a taxi driver. He was at that time an unemployed taxi driver and had been since his taxi licence expired on 18 September 2014. He had applied for his police clearance on 23 June 2014, some three months prior, knowing that there was a backlog. By the time that he contacted my office and, as I have said, the offices of other MPs, he was quite distressed and he had been out of work for over a week. He has since been unemployed, by no choice of his own, for four weeks, costing him roughly $700 to $800 per week, or approximately $2,800 to $3,200 in this last month alone.

My office has been informed today by minister Bettison's office that the offices of seven other MPs had contacted them and they have, indeed, finally solved this man's issue and ensured that he is now able to work again and that he has received his police clearance. My questions to the minister are:

1. How much hidden unemployment is there in South Australia currently due to this backlog of police and child protection clearances?

2. Will those who are unable to work, through the government's negligence and lack of supports, be recompensed or at least the fee waived for their police checks?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills, Minister for Science and Information Economy, Minister for the Status of Women, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (15:03): I thank the honourable member for her most important questions. Indeed, I am aware that there has been somewhat of a backlog of police clearance checks, and I have raised that issue personally with minister Bettison, and she has reassured me that a number of measures were being put in place to improve that processing and that they were mindful of doing all that they can to expedite the processing.

Minister Bettison explained to me that there were a number of reasons that sometimes applications took longer than was ideal. She explained that at times people had trouble filling in the form or had supplied incorrect or incomplete information, which meant that an officer then had to go back and approach the person to try to have that information filled.

Sometimes it also required from a person information that they did not have the details of, in terms of perhaps former employment and dates and suchlike. Sometimes there was a level of detail that the applicant did not have and once that was identified they then had to go back and check various events and other things. She went through and explained why some of these were less than ideal but she assured me that measures had been put in place to improve the rate of processing.

In relation to the importance of these it goes without saying that unfortunately our society has become increasingly aware of predators and opportunists. It is critical that we protect particularly our children. Unfortunately, we have had to increase our vigilance around those people who have close association with children in some way or other, and these people are now captured by this requirement for a police check.

It is most unfortunate and it is a tragic indictment of our society that we have had to come to this and we have had to put this very bureaucratic process in place. It is expensive, it is time-consuming, and it is quite cumbersome but we have had to put it in place to help protect our children. I think that is most unfortunate but I thank minister Bettison for her efforts in this area to balance those requirements around safety and protecting our children whilst, at the same time, trying to improve and streamline that clearance system.