Page 1477 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 6 April 2011
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detail of the extent to which the training and the familiarisation have been provided. The fact that they will not do it and that Ms Hunter and the Greens are prepared to support them in not doing so shows that they do not care, that they are complicit in a cover-up.
It is interesting that Ms Burch said that she is not going to support this motion because this information has already been provided to the inquiry. If it has been provided to the inquiry, why is it not good enough for the same information to be provided to members of the Legislative Assembly? What is so special about the inquiry that it has more rights than members of the Legislative Assembly? I would like the minister for education and the Minister for Children and Young People to actually come clean with the inquiry about the extent to which people are familiarised with what is in these policies and procedures.
Ms Hunter, in speaking against my motion and in favour of her amendment, actually supported the proposal that I put forward. She said that it was not enough just to give people a manual; we had to ensure compliance. “You can’t just hand over a manual,” she said, “There has to be a training and information program that goes with that.” That is what Ms Hunter said. That is what we are asking for. We are asking for the evidence of the training and the information program that goes with the manual to be provided. This motion calls for the provision of material and a schedule that shows that the staff have been made aware of it, that they have been familiarised and that there have been regular updates to ensure that they comply with the procedures.
Time and time again staff are saying to us, “We don’t know what the policies and procedures are.” Quite frankly, if the minister can come in here and table a range of policies and procedures and a schedule that shows that on a regular basis the staff are provided with an update and a refresh on this, it will prove that I am wrong. It will prove that the information being provided to me is wrong. I would be happy to find out that the information being provided to me is wrong because it would show that the administration, the management, at the Bimberi Youth Justice Centre is not as dysfunctional as is being portrayed by many people in the community. I would love to be proved wrong. I challenge the minister to prove me wrong. If she does not have the guts to prove me wrong, it is because I suspect that I am not wrong.
If there was any shadow of a doubt that the information that I was given was in any way off the mark, the minister would be down here so fast your eyes would bleed to prove that I was wrong. The clear pattern of behaviour has been that people come to us, I look into the matter as closely as possible, we talk to people, we try and confirm it, we ask questions, we inquire into it, we make a statement and the minister says, “You can’t say that; that’s not right.” But to this day she has never once proved that information that I have been provided with by staff that I raised in the Assembly is wrong. Prove me wrong, minister. I hope you can. If you cannot, you should support this motion and make it clear to all in the community the extent of the failings to provide people with information.
Ms Hunter needs to be condemned because, when it comes to the first hurdle about open government, she fails. You, Madam Assistant Speaker Le Couteur, came in here and spoke eloquently about open government. Your leader has let you down. On the
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