Page 385 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 17 February 2015
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You will not be required to be registered if you engage in a regulated activity (other than an overnight camp) for no more than three days in any four-week period or seven days in a 12-month period.
For the interest of members, my son volunteered three times more than what is allowed under the act—that is, my son went 10 times in one year to a school and volunteered rather than the allowable seven times in one year.
On the Menslink website there is a letter from the chair, and I will read from that letter:
As the recently elected Chair of Menslink I write this message to advise our community of an operational compliance matter the Menslink Board and organisation have been dealing with and unfortunately has now attracted media attention …
The Canberra Times ran a story on Thursday 12 February regarding a breach by Menslink of the Working with Vulnerable People … legislation for conducting regulated activities with young people in 2014 which was reported to the Office of Regulatory Services.
The reported matter concerned a volunteer who worked with our staff when presenting the ‘Silence Is Deadly’ program to a number of local schools. The volunteer did not hold a WWVP card and the number of times he volunteered was in excess of the number allowed in the legislation, without holding a card. At no time were school students placed at risk due to this breach …
I will continue to read from the letter from the chair of the board of Menslink:
When the matter was reported to the Menslink Board in October 2014, they took immediate action to address the issue and consequently reported the breach to the Office of Regulatory Services and affected stakeholders.
The Board subsequently reported the matter to the membership of Menslink at the Annual General Meeting in November.
The Office of Regulatory Services received the final incident report in December 2014 and recently issued Menslink with an infringement notice.
Volunteers for Menslink are supported by a trained and highly capable team and work within a defined system of responsibility. This volunteer was accompanied by a staff member of Menslink at all times, along with staff from the schools involved in the Silence is Deadly Program.
The letter continues:
The Board has implemented a review of Menslink policy and procedures to ensure there are no further breaches to this legislation.
As a community organisation, with 12 years of success working with young people, we are very disappointed this situation has occurred. Menslink will
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