Page 3921 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 29 November 2022
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report she recommended the establishment of a children and young people commissioner in the ACT. This commissioner was to have several functions. One of the main ones that she suggested was the power to convene and then chair an independent tribunal to review decisions made by government-funded services dealing with children and young people. The recommendation for an external merit review of child protection decisions was supported, according to the report, by the Childrens Court magistrates and most of the legal representatives who had been consulted by Ms Vardon as part of her inquiry.
In response, the Labor government then created the office of the Children and Young People Commissioner. Problem solved, right? Well, not exactly. Labor created the office but intentionally chose not to give the new commissioner any power to convene an independent tribunal to review child protection decisions; nor did they create any other mechanism for the external merits review of such decisions, as was supported by both the magistrates and legal representatives.
In May 2017, only a few months after becoming the shadow minister for families, youth and community services, I moved a motion in this Assembly calling on the Labor-Greens government to “recognise the importance of ensuring that decisions regarding a child’s placement and care plans be subject to external review”. From then until now, I have not once stopped demanding this reform from those opposite. I was encouraged in 2019 to hear all four members of the Human Rights Commission publicly agree with me and state:
The Commission considers that the provision of external merits review of child protection decisions … is necessary to uphold the rights of children and young people, and their families, and is essential for achieving full compliance with the ACT’s human rights obligations.
This enduring personal campaign would have been unnecessary if the Labor government had fully implemented Ms Vardon’s recommendation back in 2004. Instead, it chose to create what my Indigenous friend called a toothless commissioner. One can certainly understand, therefore, why Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families in the ACT fear that this new office might similarly lack the functions required to create real reform when it comes to the pressing issue of the over-representation of their children in out of home care. Personally, I do not blame them.
A related concern raised with me is that this new office will merely replicate the review and advocacy roles exercised by the existing Children and Young People Commissioner. The recommendation in the Our Booris, Our Way final report captures this concern by noting that, whilst Queensland, Victoria and South Australia have appointed specialist Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children’s commissioners, their roles are primarily framed as review and advocacy roles. In contrast, the steering committee specifically recommended that “the ACT appoint an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children’s Commissioner with this and additional capacity to specifically intervene and engage in child protection processes”.
As one stakeholder said, “Merely remirroring the existing Children and Young People Commissioner, as much as we love her, is not going to be the change that we need.”
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