Page 3552 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 12 September 2017
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in care; how parents can represent themselves; and how to raise concerns and make complaints within the system. These five guides are an invaluable resource not just for families but also for any agency that provides support to families navigating the child protection system.
Children and young people—protection
MRS KIKKERT: My question is to the Minister for Disability, Children and Youth. Minister, what specific lessons have been learned and implemented following the Glanfield inquiry?
MS STEPHEN-SMITH: To start with, I would refer Mrs Kikkert to a quite comprehensive statement that I made during the last sitting of the Assembly where I outlined the things that have been done to respond to the five specific Glanfield inquiry recommendations that relate to child protection. One of the incidents that, unfortunately, led to the establishment of the Glanfield inquiry was, of course, the tragic death of Bradyn Dillon and I want to take this opportunity, again, on behalf of the government, to convey our deepest sympathies to Bradyn’s mother, Rachel, and the rest of her family.
As Bradyn’s mother said recently, domestic violence is too often the cause of children being unsafe in their own home. That is why the ACT government is putting so much effort into ensuring it takes a system-wide approach to addressing family violence. And I have to say the ACT community is also responding with increased vigilance. We are seeing this through an increase in child concern reports and we have recently responded to that with extra resources, including almost $44 million committed in the 2017-18 budget.
In the wake of the Glanfield inquiry of course, the government responded to that report and two other reports with a comprehensive $21 million safer families package which was further supplemented in the most recent budget. Among the many other measures, the safer families package included almost $2½ million for enhanced child protection case management and coordination, building on work that was already underway. Part of this funding was for improved quality assurance through independent case analysis, drawing on lessons from other jurisdictions. The case analysis team provides independent analysis of individual cases at key decision points and identifies good practice, practice concerns and knowledge gaps.
At a systemic level we have established a child and youth protection quality assurance and improvement committee which includes members from other jurisdictions who offer a fresh set of eyes to identify areas for improvement in case management.
MRS KIKKERT: Minister, with due respect to Bradyn Dillon’s mother, Rachel Jones, when will the government release information about what was known about her child, Bradyn Dillon, in the weeks and months prior to his death?
MS STEPHEN-SMITH: As Mrs Kikkert is well aware, there are very strict privacy provisions under the Children and Young People Act, and I am not in a position to provide any information about the Bradyn Dillon matter.
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