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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, Second Session (54-2)
2020-07-22 Daily Xml
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Integrity Care

The Hon. R.P. WORTLEY (14:56): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Human Services a question regarding Integrity Care.

Leave granted.

The Hon. R.P. WORTLEY: On Monday 20 July, the Attorney-General spoke on ABC radio and said:

…we've already had an interim report from the taskforce led by David Caudrey and also Kelly Vincent who is well-known in this field. They hadn't, in their interim report, identified any suspension or action to be taken against Integrity Care.

The day before, on Sunday 19 July, Kelly Vincent was quoted as saying about the closure of Integrity Care, 'Every day it remains open is showing other agencies that they can get away with this,' and, 'If this isn't what it takes to get de-registered then what the hell does it take?' Yesterday, in this place the minister said:

…the task force is not looking into the details relating to the tragic death of Ann Marie Smith or the elements which necessarily include the disability services provider that was 'caring' for her at the time.

My questions to the minister are:

1. Given your previous statements that the task force is independent, why can't they look into or make recommendations about Integrity Care?

2. Given that you have banned the task force from looking into Integrity Care, why is the Attorney-General and the government not taking action to close the business on the basis that the task force hasn't recommended it?

3. To paraphrase the chair of the task force, what the hell else do they have to do or say before the government hears them and takes action?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (Minister for Human Services) (14:58): I thank the honourable member for his question, which I think it is probably fair to say was drafted on his behalf, so I don't hold him personally responsible for the number of errors that are in his question, and I guess I am going to have to repeat myself once again.

The task force was not established to look into the specific circumstances of Ann Marie Smith's tragic death; they were asked to look into the circumstances of safeguarding. Clearly, people are mindful of what is known in the public domain about what has happened to Ann Marie Smith, but there is a range of other areas about which people with disability have concerns about safeguarding, depending on which setting people are in and depending on their circumstances, whether they are in an institutional setting or, as Ann Marie Smith was, living in the community. That doesn't stop members of the task force having opinions, of course, about Ann Marie Smith, and we would be surprised if they didn't have opinions about what took place. I understand that that is the context in which Ms Vincent has made those remarks.

The task force has never been banned from looking at the circumstances of Ann Marie Smith. As I said previously in this place, they have a broad remit, but there is a police process going on at the moment. I would have thought that was a very basic, fundamental issue in terms of justice for Ann Marie Smith, that the organisation that manages that flow of information is the South Australia Police. The Quality and Safeguards Commission have a responsibility in terms of the regulation.

For Integrity Care, I do note some of the erroneous comments of the Leader of the Opposition in another place and probably the member for Hurtle Vale about the state's role in Integrity Care. I would invite the honourable member or any other member of the Labor Party to advise me under what statute the South Australian government would be deregistering Integrity Care given that it is registered with an organisation called the NDIS, the first word in that acronym is 'national'. It just beggars belief that the Labor Party try continuously to raise this issue without understanding how the regulation of these services operate across the nation.

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