Page 556 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 30 March 2021
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In 2020 the ACT government has increased the focus on trauma-informed practice and policy. Trauma-informed approaches help prevent abuse, increase help-seeking behaviours and make environments safe and supportive for victims and people at risk. Since last year’s report, changes have been made in the education, health and justice systems. All ACT public schools have implemented trauma-informed approaches to student welfare. We have developed policy guidance material to promote the integration of trauma-informed care into policies, strategies and frameworks across the ACT public health system. In the justice space, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions has begun providing trauma training to its staff and has developed detailed victim engagement policies to support and empower Canberrans when they interact with the justice system.
The ACT joined the National Redress Scheme in 2018. The scheme is a way of acknowledging the long-lasting and severe effects of abuse through a person’s lifetime. In the 2019-20 financial year the ACT government received 20 requests for information in response to applications made to the scheme operator, the commonwealth Department of Social Services, and we have responded to all of these. Seven of the requests for information related to redress applications where the ACT government was named as the responsible institution, and the other 13 named institutions that pre-date self-government. By November 2020 the government had received 45 referrals to support survivors’ access to psychological counselling. Seventeen clients accessed, or were accessing, counselling through Victim Support ACT.
The government remains committed to working closely with all stakeholders to ensure that the outcomes of the royal commission are being achieved. It is fundamentally important that we address the damage that has been done and learn from the past so that no child is left unprotected. We will continue to address every recommendation from the royal commission. I look forward to reporting again on additional progress to implement the royal commission’s recommendations later in 2021. I present the following papers:
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse—ACT Government Progress Report responding to recommendations—
Ministerial statement, 30 March 2021.
Third Annual Progress Report, dated March 2021.
I move:
That the Assembly take note of the ministerial statement.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Status of women and girls in the ACT
Ministerial statement
MS BERRY (Ginninderra—Deputy Chief Minister, Minister for Early Childhood Development, Minister for Education and Youth Affairs, Minister for Housing and
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