Page 3284 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 16 August 2011
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The use of casuals should be restricted to unexpected absences or sudden increases in resident numbers. This would be more cost effective and provide a better capacity to respond to demand.’
In December 2009, Oakton, the consultants, warned the government that they were facing trouble, that this place was not appropriately funded. In addition, Oakton pointed out, at page 359:
It appears that the ongoing costs of maintaining the security systems had not been included in the operating budget for Bimberi, and that budgetary constraints … have limited the ability of management to effectively resolve these issues.
That is issues in relation to the security system, which we know has failed on a number of occasions.
This Oakton report is not available. I have asked the inquirer for a copy; I have not had a response. My staff have asked the minister’s office for a copy; we were told by the minister’s staff that we could not have one because it was cabinet-in-confidence. In this place today, again, the Canberra Liberals have asked for a copy of the Oakton inquiry.
Mr Hanson: Open and accountable government.
MRS DUNNE: This open and accountable government, and this minister, who was a member of this government, again refused to do so. She says that the Oakton consultants report was used in formulating the budget. That was the budget in 2009-10. We are now in financial year 2011-12. It is three years old. It no longer warrants being considered cabinet-in-confidence—unless, of course, there is much more in that report that this minister is afraid will see the light of day.
The great problem with this inquiry is that very little has seen the light of day. As I have said before, not one submission has been published. I was assured in this place by the minister and Ms Hunter that the Human Rights Commission had all the powers that this Assembly had to compel witnesses and to publish. It is quite clear that that is not the case. If that was the case, the information that underpins this report would be published—just as you or I, as a chairman of an inquiry, would publish information that comes to us from the general public in relation to that inquiry so that, when the general public looks at what we have seen, there is a transparent path as to how we came to these conclusions. This is not a transparent path as to how we came to these conclusions.
That said, this is a damning report. We dwelt upon it in question time today. There has been the failure, the absolute failure, of the record-keeping system so that we cannot tell whether or not important, critical issues were dealt with. We do not know the extent to which the unfortunate incident where a young person attempted to hang themselves—we do not know how that was dealt with. We do not know how they dealt with the misuse of medication and a range of other issues.
We do know, because the inquiry has told us so, that there are substantial failures in the record-keeping system. This goes to the very heart of the system and it goes to
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