Page 2083 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 2 August 2016
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in a report on Australian privacy law in 2008 that it had heard of numerous examples of agencies’ and organisations’ concerns regarding privacy laws as a barrier to sharing information.
More recently, this year the Report of the inquiry: Review into the system level responses to family violence in the ACT by Laurie Glanfield also recommended reform to improve information sharing. Mr Glanfield dedicated a chapter of his report to the issue of information sharing and he found that poor information sharing is an Australian and international problem. He found that there is considerable room for improvement in information sharing between child protection and family violence protection agencies. Mr Glanfield recommended legislative change to clearly authorise information exchange between relevant agencies and that the ACT foster an information sharing culture between agencies.
This bill goes a long way to answering those challenges. Clause 9, proposing new section 17H of the Ombudsman Act, would enable the Ombudsman to share relevant information with relevant agencies listed in the new section. If the Ombudsman can see a gap, or if an agency thinks there is a gap, the Ombudsman can facilitate that exchange of information to get the whole picture.
Clause 14 of the bill, proposing new sections 63A and 63B of the Working with Vulnerable People (Background Checking) Act 2011, enables the Commissioner for Fair Trading to share relevant information with relevant agencies and for relevant agencies to provide information to the commissioner. Again, the provisions facilitate the whole picture for protecting children while maintaining privacy within that circle of relevant agencies.
The convention on the rights of the child is applicable to the ACT through the Human Rights Act. It notes, by the reason of their physical and mental immaturity, that children need special safeguards and care, including appropriate legal protection. This bill advances the rights of children to be afforded the appropriate legal protection intended by the convention. The evidence is clear when we consider the sometimes tragic circumstance that arise when, as a community, we are not doing all we can.
Madam Deputy Speaker, the intent of this bill is to create a better framework for identifying harm to children, stopping and preventing harm to children and investigating harm against children. The implementation will take some time and the directorate will ensure that all agencies and entities that this bill impacts on are fully aware of their new responsibilities. Clearly the Education Directorate must play a role in helping to ensure that those agencies covered by this legislation are given the information they need to ensure that the implementation is effective. As Minister for Education, I make those comments with the areas of responsibility that I have portfolio coverage of.
I would also like to indicate, as the representative of the Greens, that we fully support this bill. We believe that it is an important reform. Unfortunately, there have been many cases shown where we need these sorts of reforms. I welcome the advocacy that has taken place to produce this bill. I think that we have seen a good clear case put to the Assembly. I welcome the fact that Mr Barr has introduced this legislation in response to that advocacy that has been brought to the Assembly.
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