Page 3087 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 23 August 2005
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Moving on to the Human Rights Commission (Children and Young People Commissioner) Amendment Bill, I am significantly more enthusiastic about the establishment of a children and young people commissioner and therefore am happy to support this bill. In responding to the bill, though, I would like to draw the Assembly’s attention to the report What was said means …. This report summarises the findings of community consultation undertaken by the government on the topic of a children and young people commissioner. It is an important document and I commend the government on the extensive consultation that it undertook and the engagement of children and young people in consultation.
I think it is disappointing that the proposed functions for the commissioner as set out in the bill before us do not fully reflect the consultation findings. For example, the report states:
… the views expressed in public submissions suggested the primary role of the Commissioner should be a proactive and educative function. The Commissioner should promote the rights, interests and wellbeing of all children and young people in our community.
Yet the Human Rights Commission Bill and this amendment bill would establish a commission that will be primarily focused on service delivery. The success of our amendment to the Human Rights Commission Bill, expanding the function of the commission overall, does go some way in addressing this. The commission now has a stronger statutory basis for undertaking proactive work.
Nonetheless, we were disappointed that the amendments proposed to expand the functions of individual commissioners were not supported. And we are particularly concerned that the children and young people commissioner is at risk of focusing too exclusively on service settings because of the substantial issues relating to the implementation of the government’s response to the Murray and Vardon reports which concern the specific service system of child protection and out-of-home care.
There is no doubt that protecting and promoting the rights of children and young people in service systems, particularly those who are the most vulnerable, is very important. However, it must also be accepted that this is but one part of a much broader role that the community has envisaged for the commissioner. The establishment of a children and young people commissioner is an opportunity to provide a benefit to all children and young people, including, but not limited to, those within service delivery systems.
Many of the issues that affect a large number of children and young people are much broader issues of citizenship, community acceptance, involvement in decision making and representation. The consultations identified a much broader role for the commissioner, and that is what we would like to see. Of the eight key areas of functions for the commissioner identified in the community consultation report, only four have been adopted in the functions set out in the bill before us.
It is my understanding that the government intends to introduce further legislation concerning the children and young people commissioner in roughly six months time. Perhaps at this time they may plan to expand the role of the commission. I would prefer
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