Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2018-09-18 Daily Xml

Contents

Thinker in residence

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (15:09): My question is to the Minister for Human Services. Can the minister advise about the current situation with the Thinker in Residence, Dr Guy Turnbull?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (Minister for Human Services) (15:09): I thank the honourable member for his question. Honourable members may recall that the Thinker in Residence program, which was established under the previous government and which they then cut, has been taken up by the Don Dunstan Foundation. Their most recent Thinker in Residence is a gentleman by the name of Dr Guy Turnbull, who has come to Adelaide with extensive experience of employee mutuals having founded an incredibly successful employee-owned cooperative in the UK: Care and Share Associates (CASA).

I had the privilege of meeting Dr Turnbull last week. As I said, he founded CASA in 2004 and grew it from a start-up pioneering social franchise to a £17 million turnover per year employee-owned social enterprise. Dr Turnbull has also worked across the UK as a social economy consultant specialising in business planning, social franchising and strategic planning. He created RED (Rapid Enterprise Development) workshops—an innovative training approach to social enterprise development with people with a disability.

In 2016, Dr Turnbull won the Outstanding Contribution to Social Care category in the Great British Care Awards. He was also the UK national finalist in Ernst and Young's prestigious global competition, Entrepreneur of the Year. In 2017, Dr Turnbull received an honorary fellowship from Social Enterprise UK.

The cooperative sector is an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through jointly owned and democratically controlled enterprises. From 1 October, there will be a new cooperative in South Australia. The Department of Human Services is launching Kudos, which is Australia's first public sector mutual for Child and Youth Services (CYS), to transition this service to the non-government sector while retaining the highly skilled workforce.

Dr Turnbull has been engaged to consult on the CYS mutual project. He has spoken to the board and staff about founding a mutual enterprise and shared his tips for success. I wish Dr Turnbull well in his time in South Australia and look forward to receiving more information about his activities here and the learnings we can take from him.