Page 2893 - Week 08 - Thursday, 17 August 2017
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government-funded services dealing with children and young people. The Human Rights Commission Act created the position of Children and Young People Commissioner but ignored the Vardon report’s recommended tribunal and likewise failed to provide the commissioner with specific jurisdiction to review CYPS decisions. The functions of the office include encouraging the resolution of complaints, but this is not proper administrative review.
Moreover, the situation in the territory has been so dire that Alasdair Roy, the Children and Young People Commissioner from 2008 to 2016, eventually gave up even trying to help resolve most complaints. As the Canberra Times reported in 2013:
Families and young people who complain to the ACT Human Rights Commission about their treatment by care and protection services are being referred back to the directorate, because the commissioner does not have the resources to deal with their complaints.
Just last year, current commissioner Jodie Griffiths-Cook told the ABC that it was common knowledge that her office was dangerously overworked and could not provide even basic oversight.
Another failed opportunity to address this issue passed in 2008 with the creation of the territory’s much-needed Civil and Administrative Tribunal, or ACAT. Subsequently, certain CYPS decisions were identified as merits reviewable in the ACT, but as last year’s Glanfield inquiry insightfully notes, a number of important decisions such as care plans, the amending of care plans and the decision not to provide information to a child’s parents were not included. I have to assume that these omissions reflect the longstanding unwillingness of Labor governments to allow for rigorous oversight of these decisions.
The purpose of a tribunal is to provide for simple, inexpensive, quick and fair resolution of concerns, thereby enhancing the quality of decision-making under legislation. As the Australian Administrative Review Council has noted, access to external review “improves the whole system of government decision by increasing its openness and transparency and providing feedback on its performance”.
In the words of Justice Deirdre O’Connor, “Confident executive government should welcome this kind of audit”. Tribunals provide an attractive alternative to judicial review, which can be inaccessible to many people because of complexity and cost. But the situation in the ACT is even more complicated than that. The Glanfield inquiry specifically points out that decisions regarding a child’s placement are legally not subject to judicial review in this territory, pursuant to the Administrative Decisions (Judicial Review) Act. All of this has left parents, carers and agencies exactly where they were 13 years ago, when they unanimously shared with the Vardon report their frustration about having nowhere to go and their desire for an independent mediator.
Amongst those who have joined the swelling chorus of voices calling for some form of external review of important CYPS decisions is former Children and Young People Commissioner Alasdair Roy, who told the Glanfield inquiry:
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