Page 516 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 20 February 2019
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conversations with parents. It was disappointing to hear that parents still feel as though they are not getting the information they need. Schools need to be working in partnership with parents when responding to these kinds of incidents.
While I would love to see the situation where there are no violent incidents in ACT schools, I recognise that schools are becoming increasingly complex environments and that at times these things will happen. That is not to excuse them, but simply to accept the reality that, when dealing with human beings, incidents can occur. The key questions from my perspective are: do we have systems in place to identify issues early and to intervene to prevent escalation; and do we have the right procedures in place to respond appropriately if an incident does occur? My view is that the government was presented with a comprehensive set of recommendations which will put these systems and procedures in place.
We have already had a significant independent review as well as the independent oversight of the Work Safety Commissioner. The progress reports that we have seen on the schools for all project show that the recommendations are being implemented. It is only fair to give the government time to also implement the actions under the enforceable undertaking, some of which had already been started when it was entered into.
In particular, I want to reflect on the three key strategies detailed in the enforceable undertaking. Firstly, the directorate will continue to implement its occupational violence policy and management plan, which was launched in June 2017. As Minister Berry noted in the motion we debated last October, staff in all 87 ACT government schools were scheduled to have completed occupational violence training by the end of term 4 of 2018. An additional component of this strategy is improving avenues for reporting on incidents, which at some level explains why we are seeing an increase in the number of incidents being reported. I am confident that with appropriate training and support, these numbers will start to stabilise, and ideally reduce over time.
The second key strategy is to share the ACT’s experience and learnings with other Australian education systems. Although I will not go into great detail on this item today, I will just note that it is good to take the opportunity to share our experiences as well as learn from other jurisdictions where we can. I do not think it goes to Ms Lee’s motion, but it is an important longer term strategy.
Finally, and importantly, there is a commitment to work with parents to build a shared understanding of violence in schools, its impact, and how to minimise and respond to it. This is an area I am concerned about, so I am pleased to see it specifically listed as a priority. It is clear from some of the examples we have heard about recently that communication with parents and carers has not been as good as it should have been. The minister has acknowledged this, and I know it is an area of focus.
The key challenge in this space is achieving a consistent and effective approach across all school communities. We know there are some schools that have excellent processes in place to communicate and engage with parents. However, it has certainly been put to me that the application of the relevant processes is not occurring consistently across all ACT schools. Clearly, some parents do not feel they are getting
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