Nola Marino (Forrest, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Crimes Amendment (Working With Children—Criminal History) Bill 2009. The proposed amendments in this bill will create an exception for convictions of persons who work, or seek to work, with children so that those convictions are disclosed and can be taken into account by Commonwealth, state and territory screening agencies in determining whether the person is suitable to work with children. Working to protect and ensure our children are safe is, and should be, a priority for all Australians, as I am sure it is; therefore, the coalition is supportive of this bill. Every day we see children in our communities and parents have a lot of confidence in those to whom they entrust the care of their children, and they need to be able to do so.

This bill implements the agreement of the Council of Australian Governments on 29 November 2008 to facilitate the interjurisdictional exchange of criminal history information regarding people working, or seeking to work, with children, including information about spent, pardoned or quashed convictions. As part of the agreement, each jurisdiction is required to remove any legislative impediments to the exchange of the criminal history information for people seeking to work with children. This legislation has a number of safeguards for protecting both the children and those who are currently working with children or seeking or applying to work with children.

Such safeguards include a comprehensive regime for assessing people who work, or seek to work, with children. They must be balanced with a person’s right to rehabilitation, privacy and employment. Criminal history information received will only be used for the limited purpose of assessing the risk that a person may pose in working with children and not for another purpose. A potential employee’s criminal history information will not be given to their employer. The employer will simply receive a yes or no from the screening unit. The information may not be used for the purpose of a general integrity or employment suitability check, and a person has the right of appeal. A person with a no can appeal the decision of a screening unit and is able to view the reason for the no decision and why it was made. It is important that we are having a 12-month trial of the new sharing arrangement system—which will start in November 2009—between the agencies that already have screening units. This is another important check and balance.

Such safeguards are essential in protecting Australian children against predators and to ensure the privacy of those seeking to work with children. It is, as we are aware, a very unfortunate fact that child abuse occurs regularly in Australia. Furthermore, I was very disturbed to read in the Daily Telegraph on 19 October that there were five times more sex crimes committed on children by children than five years ago. I think that would be a statistic which is disturbing to many in this place. Also, the number of cases in which children have indecently assaulted a child under the age of 10 has doubled since 2004. The same article quoted Professor Freda Briggs, from the University of South Australia, who stated that schools often write off assaults by children on other students as typical childhood bad behaviours, without the victim being recognised or removed from a dangerous situation. Unfortunately, this is in line with an article from 12 November in a local newspaper in my electorate which stated that, according to a 2005 national report, it is estimated that only 36 per cent of domestic violence cases are reported to police. These articles are proof and a reminder of the need to reinforce the message that it is not acceptable for an adult or a fellow child to commit a crime against a child, and this needs to be seriously reinforced.

The Western Australian Attorney-General and Minister for Corrective Services, Christian Porter, summarised Western Australia’s current position on working with children criminal history checks in his submission to the Senate inquiry, and I quote:

The Western Australian Parliament has enacted the Working with Children (Criminal Record Checking) Act 2004 (WA), which provides for procedures for checking the criminal record of people who carry out, or propose to carry out, child-related work and to prohibit people who have been charged with or convicted of certain offences from carrying out child-related work.

The Western Australian government takes child protection very seriously—as do members in this House—with the WA Minister for Child Protection, the Hon. Robyn McSweeney, announcing amendments on 3 November to the Working with Children (Criminal Record Checking) Act 2004 (WA), which aims to close the current loopholes relating to working with children cards. These amendments will strengthen the current act and exclude people with criminal histories that indicate they may harm a child from starting or continuing child related work, regardless of whether that is paid or voluntary work. These amendments will see additional sexual offences added to the current class 1 schedule offences. Additional improvements will also see the capacity to receive an act on notification by the police commissioner of non-scheduled offences where persons have a change in criminal record and can no longer undertake child related work. These amendments in WA will strengthen the act and bring the child further into direct focus. In WA the working with children act is administered, as I said, by Robyn McSweeney, the Minister for Child Protection. I have great faith in her commitment to improving the safety of children in our communities by helping to prevent people who have such a criminal history from working with children, as this bill before us seeks to do.

I have been informed by the Western Australian Department for Child Protection that since the working with children check was introduced in Western Australia over 240,000 clearance cards have been issued. This equates to approximately one in every 10 Western Australians having a working with children clearance card. What is probably important for this House to note is that, of that number, approximately 150 negative checks have been recorded, meaning that children in Western Australia have been protected from approximately 150 potential predators. This demonstrates the value of this process.

The Western Australian criminal check system is live, meaning that information for registered cardholders is continually updated and is not simply based on the criminal record at the time of the application. As you can imagine, the advantage of this procedure is that any person who has applied for and received a working with children card and has since been convicted of an offence is made known to the administrative authority and action can be taken quickly to protect the children.

My electorate of Forrest, like most regional and rural electorates, often has a very relaxed social atmosphere and parents can sometimes be more trusting of members of the community with their children. While I know this lifestyle is so cherished by most of us and all of us who care about our children and our community it may increase the potential for a child predator to be exposed to children perhaps than is the case in other circumstances. I personally had experience with a trusted adult working with children in my own town who after investigation was revealed to be abusing a number of local children. It may be argued that this situation may have been avoided if the working with children criminal history check legislation had been in force at the time. However, if the person did not have a prior record this would not have altered the outcome.

We all know that nothing at all can beat parental supervision and awareness. I encourage all parents to take a very direct interest in those who are engaged with their children at all levels. The impact of this particular situation was not only on these trusting children and their parents and families but also on other children and our whole community. The whole community was damaged by this case and still is. In some instances the sustained and severe impacts on the individual children who are now adults will never, ever be mitigated. Some will never recover and some will never be able to live a balanced and happy life. The importance of this legislation and the potential impact it could have on children’s lives is significant.

As the Bills Digest states, ‘ensuring the protection and safety of children is always a desirable outcome.’ I know from speaking with members on all sides of the political debate that that is clearly a focus for everybody in this house. Toni, a small-business owner from my electorate, had the following to say about WA’s working with children criminal check system:

I have the working with children card and think that it is a must. It was one of the first things I got when starting my new business which is taking ponies to children’s parties. I advertise the fact that I have one,—

that is, the card—

and I have been told that this is why people ring to hire me.

Christina, who is a teacher in the town of Donnybrook in my electorate, has said:

As a teacher working with kindergarten children for the past 17 years, I applaud and support any check that screens people in this profession. I am of the belief that if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear. I see it being pointless to limit information regarding these checks to within each state, when many teachers and support staff move interstate.

I, like my coalition colleagues, see benefits in enhancing child protection in Australia by facilitating the interjurisdictional exchange of criminal history information regarding people working with or seeking to work with children. Authorities and potential employees must be made aware of the fact that some people are just not suited to be with or around children. I support this legislation.

Chris Hayes (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Crimes Amendment (Working With Children—Criminal History) Bill 2009. Children, as we all know, depend on adults. Clearly many of us here are parents, and I can say proudly in addition to that I am a grandparent and it is a very special time of life.

Kids actually do require adult supervision, whether it is from family members, family friends, teachers, football coaches, netball coaches, Scout troop and Girl Guide group leaders et cetera. The development in kids of new horizons is going to depend on the quality of adult supervision and interaction. Most of us who are parents, or in my case now as a grandparent, want nothing less for our kids than for them to experience the full range of activities that will enable them to fully develop their adult potential. So we certainly have a vital obligation to look at the issue of protecting our kids. We can no longer simply take for granted that we hold these views and that therefore everyone else holds the same view. I am pleased that this piece of legislation meets with bipartisan support. Why would it not.

There is no question that it involves an intrusion on liberties. Information will be distributed and, as I will go into a little later, will be used for the right purposes. But there is an overall good to be achieved, which is the development of potential in our kids. It will help to protect our kids from things that, when I was growing up, I have to say I certainly did not know all that much about. I suppose the reason for this was that I was heavily protected by my family. Many years back, I discovered that my father, who is now 86, was assaulted when he was young. He was badly beaten by a teacher at a religious school. He was in a coma. He was sent into the far west of Sydney—to a children’s home run, I think, by Barnardos. It was three months, so it was quite a serious assault. So there was probably a very clear reason why I and my brother and sister were protected when we grew up. If that could occur in a religious environment—an environment where people probably did not speak about those things—then no wonder we are seeing now what occurred to so many young people over a long period of time. People like me can say they did not see it when they grew up, but clearly it was there.

This piece of legislation is timely. It comes down in the very week of the apology being made to the forgotten Australians. I will be talking about them a little later on. As a matter of fact, a fellow in my electorate, John Hennessy, recounted to me what was meted out to him physically, emotionally and sexually when he was young. He is no longer young but it is something that has stayed with him all his life. It falls to us in our generation to say that these things simply should not occur and that we will take every step available to us to ensure that we protect the young in our community.

Screening is a vital tool if we are to take this promise seriously. Screening will help prevent people with a known history in violent and abusive behaviour towards children gaining access to them in various organisations. To this end, the development and implementation of a policy of legislation that provides full pre-employment screening of adults or people working as volunteers in child related organisations is an important strategy for creating and maintaining a child safe environment. Currently there is no single national framework setting out the requirements for obtaining checks for people working with children. Whilst I am on that issue, I would like to congratulate the Police Federation of Australia. They have campaigned on a range of different things, but in particular they have very strongly campaigned to have some degree of uniformity in relation to child protection matters.

Each state and territory has worked quite diligently and, no doubt, expertly within their own jurisdiction to protect children. They have procedures which require people who work in various industries that engage with children to go through these checks, but there are differences. It should be known that most states and territories have already introduced, or are in the advanced stages of developing, prescreening checks for people working with children. This legislation identifies broad categories of child related work where employers, employees and volunteers must undergo screening requirements.

There are differences across the jurisdictions regarding the types of screening programs that are in place, what records are checked and what can be transmitted. There are two types of screening programs in the country. Some states have an employee driven system, like New South Wales and South Australia, which makes it mandatory for employers in relevant fields to carry out background checks on prospective employees or volunteers coming within their purview. This system is a point-in-time background check and individuals must undertake screening each time they enter into a child related employment position, a child related position with a voluntary organisation et cetera.

The other type of check—and I congratulate the member for Forrest, who adequately described the position in Western Australia—which actually applies in Queensland, Victoria, Western Australia and the Northern Territory, offers certification of individuals to engage in child related work. These certificates are valid for a period of, I think, three years in Western Australia and provide ongoing monitoring of an individual’s suitability for child related work. That means that, if a relevant criminal offence is committed during the validity of the certificate or if an individual is subject to a relevant work related disciplinary procedure, the administering authority may inform employers of the offence and alter or withdraw the individual’s entitlement to work with children. Individuals can also carry the certification between positions. Again, this was indicated by the member for Forrest. This way they do not have to undergo a repeated check each time they take on a position to work with children.

The Crimes Amendment (Working With Children—Criminal History) Bill 2009 aims to enhance the safety of children in our community by helping prevent people with a criminal history that indicates that they may harm children from working with children. It implements what was agreed at COAG on 29 November last year to facilitate an interjurisdictional exchange of criminal history information for people working with, or seeking to work with, children. Currently the provisions of the Crimes Act prevent disclosure of a person’s full criminal history. This bill will amend the Crimes Act 1914 to enable the disclosure and use of criminal history information about a person’s pardoned, quashed or spent convictions but only for the purpose of child related employment screening.

Essentially to prevent the misuse of information, safeguards have been included in the bill which will prevent the information being used for the purpose of general probity checks, other than in relation to working with children. Another essential safeguard under the COAG arrangement is that this bill limits the release of this information to persons or bodies required or permitted by law to obtain or deal with this information. The disclosure and use of information received under the exchange will be subject to various safeguards and conditions. To reinforce the magnitude of these safeguards, before any person or body receiving the information is approved, the minister himself must be satisfied that they meet all of the safeguards in their jurisdiction.

Finally, given the sensitive nature of the information that will be available under the information exchange, a review of these amendments will be conducted after an initial trial to commence no later than 30 June 2011 and to be completed within three months. As I earlier stated, the object of all these amendments is to protect children from sexual, physical and emotional harm. Much research has been done and, as any parent knows, the abuse of a child is something that they carry with them forever and something that has significant impacts on our community. This week we offered our apology to the forgotten Australians. It is appropriate that this week we commit to this legislation to do whatever we possibly can to protect our children into the future. I commend the bill to the House.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Early Childhood Education, Childcare, Women and Youth) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Crimes Amendment (Working With Children—Criminal History) Bill 2009 because the safety and security of children is undoubtedly the most important concern for parents. In fact, it should be a priority of governments at all levels. Nothing, quite frankly, is more important. Governments at both the state and federal levels need to do more beyond the rhetoric and this bill is a small step in that direction. Its main purpose is to strengthen criminal history checks for people working with children. I know that, generally speaking, as a society we do have to strike a balance and give people who have served their time the opportunity to perhaps be rehabilitated. But, at the same time it, is my strong personal view that when it comes to children we should not take any risks. They should not be the guinea pigs at the end of the line to see whether or not someone has been adequately rehabilitated. They are vulnerable. They are deserving of not just our guidance but our serious protection. We just cannot take the slightest chance when it comes to their safety. As a relatively new mother, I understand that and feel that with great intensity. No other parent is different from that.

People who work with children are afforded an extraordinary privilege but also a responsibility. Parents place enormous trust in them and it is incumbent upon governments to ensure that they can be confident that systems are in place to ensure that no-one who may not be suitable is given the responsibility and the entree of working with their children. I am sure that is an expectation that parents hold. Unfortunately, many state governments around the country in the administration of some of their departments and child protection do not take that responsibility seriously and do not provide adequate resources. We see the human tragedy resulting from that.

As shadow minister for early childhood education and child care, I am pleased that this bill—in ensuring that those who have a potential problem are prevented from working with children—will actually help protect the reputation and integrity of early childhood and childcare professionals. We have some extraordinarily dedicated and talented people working in this industry across the country and in every corner of Australia. As I have visited childcare centres and preschools, I have met some remarkable people who are very passionate about their work and for whom, very often, remuneration is secondary. Indeed, they could go off and do other things and be paid more generously but they have a passion and a commitment to children and early childhood development. They do have a tough job. It is a very important job. I think it is appropriate to take this opportunity to thank all of those people who have a passion for working with young children—all the teachers, carers, social workers and others—and who help nurture and shape in such a positive way the future generation.

The aim of this bill, as I see it, is to reinforce the fact that safeguarding our children from physical, sexual and other forms of abuse must be a priority for law makers and governments. It implements the agreement that was reached at COAG on 29 November 2008 to enable the jurisdictional exchange of further criminal history information for people working with children. This agreement followed an agreement under the Howard government in April 2007 to a framework to improve access to interjurisdictional criminal history information by child related employment-screening schemes.

The current provisions in the Crimes Act do prevent the disclosure of a person’s full criminal history. The bill, however, does carve out an exception to these provisions, allowing for the interjurisdictional exchange of criminal history information, including information on pardon, quashed and spent convictions of those who work, or who seek to work, with children. The exchange of the information permitted by the bill will be subject to safeguards to ensure that the information is dealt with appropriately and to limit any potential misuse of information. The Minister for Home Affairs made assurances to the House in his introductory speech on 20 August 2009 to that effect. It is appropriate to consider a person’s full criminal history when assessing their appropriateness to work with children because, while there is a belief that people do deserve a second chance, in this case the safety of children is the first and primary priority.

While we are talking about police checks and criminal records, I want to take the opportunity to talk about the need to further protect children. In my view, we do need to strengthen sentences for those who commit crimes against children, particularly those who commit paedophilia. Unfortunately, we only tend to discuss the issue when it makes front-page news, like we did a few months back when convicted paedophile Dennis Ferguson was forced to move out of his latest abode. It is just a matter of time before we once again see an outraged local community—concerned mums and dads and grandparents—holding placards and rallying against having another Mr Ferguson as a neighbour. It has happened at least four times in the last five years, and the scene will be replayed over and over with this individual and with others.

Each time, we see public opinion divided into two camps: the larger one believing that this repeat offender ought not to be living in their community, certainly not near their children or where children go to school or play, and the smaller camp decrying this sort of vigilantism and claiming that the particular fellow—as it usually is—has a right to live in the community having done his time. Let us just stop for a moment and look at the concept of having done time: what does our society consider, not just through our laws but through the sentences imposed by judges, an appropriate sentence to fit the crime of sexually penetrating—let us call it what it is: raping—a small child, or three children?

I am sure many Australians would be disturbed to see how much time these people have to serve in jail if they are actually caught. This fellow planned his crime while doing time in Long Bay Gaol for a range of offences that include various assaults on children and indecent assaults on females. When he was released from jail, he and a partner tracked down a fellow inmate’s three children, aged six, seven and eight, abducted them from their home in Sydney, flew them to Brisbane and held them prisoner. He repeatedly raped them until the police arrived some days later. The judge in Ferguson’s trial said that the chances of rehabilitation were zero—zilch. He was sentenced to just 14 years—14 years for a crime that was so premeditated and so vile—a crime that no doubt, unfortunately, imposed a life sentence on the most vulnerable of victims, the three very small children.

Sadly, as we all know, this is not a one-off case. We appear to have a somewhat double standard when it comes to sexual offences. If they are perpetrated against an adult without their consent, it is an aggressive act and a very serious matter. If they are perpetrated against a child, it is less talked about; it is that molestation thing, that matter that we do not seem that comfortable talking about. The focus seems to shift to the sexual deviancy of the perpetrator and away from the victim.

While it is difficult to get a clear understanding of the sentencing for child rape vis-à-vis adult rape because many jurisdictions classify them all as sexual offences, there is evidence that we do not afford our children the same level of sentencing protection as we afford to adults. The Victorian Sentencing Advisory Council provides statistical information on sentencing. It found that in Victoria, from 2006-07 to 2007-08, the average effective sentence term for cases of sexual penetration of a child aged between 10 to 16 years was just 1.9 years for a single offence. It was just 3.3 years if the child was under the age of 10. In fact, if there had been up to 10 sexual offences committed against a child, those averages rose to just 4.8 and 5.2 years respectively. The median length of imprisonment for the rape of an adult was five years, with sentences varying from two to 20 years. I am not for one moment arguing that one crime is less heinous than the other. They are both abhorrent. But I do believe, and I am not alone in believing, that we have a very special duty of care to protect the most vulnerable in our community, and innocent, trusting children are very high on, if not at the top of, that list.

When I rose in parliament earlier this year to raise this issue, I pointed out that it is not something that people like to talk about, because they find it very disturbing and sometimes in polite company very distasteful. But it is a reality that we have to face, and as legislators even more so. It is estimated that, from an economic standpoint, child abuse costs our nation about $4 billion a year. The social price that we pay is, of course, much higher and the human cost is immeasurable. We see women who have been abused as children having a considerably higher risk of experiencing sexual violence in their adult life, more so than the rest of us, at 54 per cent compared with 26 per cent. Perhaps the most disturbing aspect is that the sexual offences that come to the attention of the police are only a very small proportion of the sexual offences that occur in our community. Sadly, most of our victims are victimised by someone they know, and this is a problem that also needs to be addressed. Tougher sentences certainly need to be looked at. The way that we view the crime of paedophilia needs to be rethought. The terminology we use to describe crimes against children should be much stronger. The outrage we as a community feel should not be confined just to a situation when a paedophile moves into our immediate neighbourhood. It needs to be a concern that is ongoing. Clearly the concepts of trust, protection and love within a family need to be reinforced in our society, and the value of children and good parenting needs to be supported.

We have seen the premature sexualisation of children in the media as a serious and growing issue. This does need to be examined, as does the trend to excuse unacceptable behaviour through moral relativism. We saw this recently with Hollywood rallying to absolve filmmaker Roman Polanski of his crime of having sex with a 13-year-old. So it is an uphill battle. We have the glamorous Hollywood protecting this sort of behaviour, and what sort of message does that send out to the community and to young people? So it is not a problem that has an easy, quick fix, but it is a problem that we need to acknowledge and discuss. This bill is a welcome and positive, albeit small, step in that direction.

Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the introduction of the Crimes Amendment (Working With Children—Criminal History) Bill 2009. This bill implements the agreed reforms from the November 2008 COAG meeting which facilitate the interjurisdictional exchange of criminal history information for people working with children. This bill contains amendments to the Crimes Act 1914, which provides that a person whose conviction is spent, pardoned or quashed does not have to disclose the fact of the conviction. The act also prohibits others from disclosing the conviction without the person’s consent. The amendments to the Crimes Act create an exception for the convictions of persons who work or seek to work with children so that those convictions can be taken into account by Commonwealth, state and territory screening agencies in determining whether someone is suitable to work with children. These amendments will help protect children from sexual, physical and emotional abuse by permitting criminal history information to be disclosed and taken into account in assessing the suitability of someone to work with children.

Most decent-minded people would consider serious child abuse as a most abhorrent crime. They would find it incomprehensible, yet humanity’s record of protecting children is shameful. It would be considered one of mankind’s most serious failings. Whether it be child slavery or child soldiers—and I understand, according to United Nations figures, that right now there are some 300,000 child soldiers around the world—or sexual abuse of children, at times resulting in sexually motivated killings, or the forcible removal of children from their families, examples of child abuse span every generation, every country and every culture throughout the world. Even today, in a world that is better educated than ever before, child abuse throughout the world appears to be as prevalent as ever. What makes child abuse so repulsive is that those who commit the worst acts of child abuse are adults, who, having been children themselves, must surely understand the fear, the suffering and the hurt that they are inflicting. As with domestic violence, child abuse is one of those issues that many people refuse to talk about, accept or expose.

On a positive note, here in Australia more and more cases of child abuse are being exposed by authorities and the issue is being publicly discussed. That is a good thing. The National Association for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect states that over 30,000 children are abused or neglected in Australia each year. One in three girls is sexually abused before the age of 18 years. One in seven boys is sexually abused before the age of 18 years. In 2007-08 there were 55,120 reports of child abuse and neglect substantiated by the child protection services. As staggering as these figures are, the reality is that so many more cases go unreported or unsubstantiated.

We will never really know the magnitude of the problem. What we do know is that the figures are trending upwards. In 2007-08 there were 31,166 young people in out-of-home care living away from home for their own protection, a number which has doubled in the last decade. We are also seeing exposed offences against children perpetrated by family members or other individuals in positions of trust and authority who, over long periods of time, grossly abused their position of trust and children in their care—people who destroyed the lives of others and were able to continue reoffending because others failed to intervene. The protection of children is the responsibility of the whole community, of all members of society. Sadly, most child offenders are repeat offenders. For that reason the exchange of all police information, including spent information, about a person seeking to work with children will add another level of protection for children. It will be welcomed throughout the community. Conversely, not to do so and to then have further offences committed by that person against children would be unforgivable. Put simply, the benefit of any doubt in these matters should always be given to the children.

I note that the minister, in introducing this bill, referred to the many child abuse cases that are never successfully prosecuted, in order to protect the child victim from the stress and trauma of giving evidence. The conviction therefore fails and the criminal record does not exist. So, in a sense, in order to protect the child, we are having to protect the offender, and the offender gets off scot-free. It is my view that that kind of information should be made available between jurisdictions to authorities seeking information about a person who is intended to be placed in a role associated with children.

I will quote some statistics from the organisation Adults Surviving Child Abuse which demonstrate the devastating consequences that abuse as a child can have in someone’s adult life. Seventy-six per cent of adults who report child abuse are likely to suffer from one or more psychiatric disorder in their lifetime. Forty-five per cent of young homeless people report physical or sexual abuse as a factor in leaving home. One study found that 65 per cent of prisoners were victims of physical and sexual abuse as a child. People who suffer child abuse as a child are more likely to suffer mental illness and experience homelessness and drug and alcohol abuse as an adult. The suicide rate of young Australian survivors of child abuse is 10 to 13 times higher than the national rate. Mr Deputy Speaker Georganas, I notice that you have a motion on the issue of suicide coming up before this parliament next week. I will be taking the opportunity to speak about that, but I commend you in raising that matter, because it is very much tied to this issue of child abuse. Most disturbingly of all, 30 per cent of people maltreated as children will in turn go on to maltreat others when they are adults. This leads to a cycle of child abuse across generations and throughout history, as I described before.

It is timely that we are discussing this bill at a time that the nation has issued an apology to the forgotten Australians and the child migrants. That apology was the right thing to do. It was long overdue and it will acknowledge and give credibility to the sufferings of the forgotten Australians. It also highlights that, as a society, we must remain forever vigilant to the incidence of child abuse. Hardly a day passes without a new case being reported in the media. I want to quote from a couple of media articles. The first is an article by Mark Metherell and Adele Horin. In the article, those two journalists say:

The number of youngsters aged under 18 on care and protection orders has soared to 34,279, up 37 per cent in the three years to 2008, says the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s biennial report on welfare.

The number of cases notified to agencies in 2007-08 was 195,387, of which NSW was responsible for 103,355.

That was an article in today’s paper. This is what is being reported right now.

A report by Ainslie MacGibbon, on 29 October 2009, quotes Associate Professor Warwick Middleton, who is a specialist in trauma related syndromes and has been director of the trauma and dissociation unit at Belmont Hospital in Brisbane for 13 years. Professor Middleton says that shocking cases of long-term sexual abusers like Josef Fritzl are far more common than widely believed. Most of us have heard and read the accounts of Josef Fritzl but, according to Professor Middleton, those cases are far more common and prevalent than we understand. He says:

… the abuse usually starts at about three years of age, and I see women who are 50 still being abused by the same person. It is typical of this group to experience anywhere between 2000 and 10,000 abusive acts over a lifetime.

He estimates that about one in 1,000 people experience incestuous abuse into adulthood. Those figures are certainly alarming, if nothing else. It just highlights the magnitude of a problem that is generally swept under the carpet by society.

Mr Deputy Speaker Georganas, as a fellow South Australian, you would be familiar with the South Australian Children in State Care Commission of Inquiry into child abuse by Commissioner Ted Mullighan that commenced in 2004. His 600-page report, with 54 recommendations, was tabled in state parliament on 1 April 2008. I want to quote from the findings of that report and also from a press statement put out on the day that the report was tabled in state parliament. The statement by Commissioner Ted Mullighan reads:

Many people told me it was the first time they had ever disclosed the sexual abuse, and that they had been ashamed and embarrassed for their whole lives. To have the chance to tell their story, and be believed for the first time, was an enormous relief.

This statement highlights just how many people must live with the torment of having been abused but never talk about it. Perhaps the abuse affects their way of life thereafter—I am sure it does. Perhaps it is brought out in different ways but they never talk about it. Sadly, they do have to live with it. What is just as concerning is that those who cause the abuse might continue to abuse. I quoted the figures of the people who have been abused as children and who, as adults, are still being abused. It is remarkable to try and understand that.

I said earlier that the responsibility for children lies with all of us. This responsibility does not just lie with government or any particular department of government; it is a responsibility that all in society should bear. In that respect, I want to talk very briefly about a program that is currently underway in my electorate of Makin—the Salisbury Communities for Children program. This is an example of how a community can come together to try and prevent child abuse. It is an example of people working together to improve the lives of children in their community. The Salisbury Communities for Children program is also often referred to as FamilyZone. These FamilyZone hubs facilitate the prevention of child abuse and neglect by bringing families together with a range of support services for families with children up to five years of age.

Salisbury Communities for Children was established around the idea that effective early childhood intervention is about supporting not only the children themselves but also their parents, their neighbourhoods and the broader community. What began as a playgroup that met three days per week at the Salvation Army Ingle Farm in 2005 became two support centres for young families in the northern suburbs. The FamilyZone support centres located at Ingle Farm and Para Hills provide a range of initiatives for children and families. These include parent education, community play areas, young mum support groups and specific programs for new arrivals, such as English classes, and dedicated support groups for families of Afghani and African backgrounds. FamilyZone hubs work in partnership with the relevant federal, state and local government agencies, including health, community and education services, and also non-government organisations. As well as educating parents, Salisbury Communities for Children has partnered with the University of South Australia and TAFE South Australia to provide early childhood leadership training courses for early childhood professionals.

The excellent work being carried out by Karl Brettig and his team at the Salisbury Communities for Children provides the nurturing environment that all young children need and deserve. I have attended their centres, I have seen the work they do, I have spoken to the parents and I have spoken to Mr Brettig about the programs. They also provide information and support that allows adults to be better parents for their children. Salisbury Communities for Children centre is very highly regarded by parents and families throughout the community, and this is evidenced by the increase in community participation in, and the always strong demand for, the programs since the centre was established in 2005.

I raise that as an example of how communities can collectively take a responsibility to ensure that children, wherever they might be, are given the protection they quite rightly deserve, and sometimes need. Through communities working together, issues and risks can be exposed by ways other than waiting for the child to come forward and talk about it. The right intervention can then take place. I commend Karl and his team for their work. I note that Karl has been asked to go and speak about child safety measures at a conference in Western Australia this week because of the success of that program. I certainly commend it to other communities. This is a bill that will be welcomed by the community. I certainly welcome it. I commend the bill to the House.

Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Home Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

in reply—I thank members for their contributions to the debate and I thank all members, including opposition members, for their support of the Crimes Amendment (Working With Children—Criminal History) Bill 2009. I appreciate the passion with which members have spoken about their desire to protect our children from abuse. The member for Indi suggested that penalties for child sex related offences should be increased. I recently released a discussion paper proposing a range of enhancements to Commonwealth child sex related offences, including increases in penalties for certain offences and the introduction of new higher penalty aggravated offences.

I would like to clarify the comments by member for Cowan about the reasons for taking into account pardoned and quashed convictions. A person whose conviction has been pardoned or quashed is held to be innocent of the offence with which he or she was charged and tried. Some members commented on the requirements for working with children checks in states and territories. This bill does not affect those existing requirements for individuals who work with children to obtain a check in the state and territory in which they are employed. The bill is designed to enhance the effectiveness of those checks by allowing the provision of a broader range of Commonwealth criminal history information to state and territory screening units that undertake child related employment screening.

Nevertheless, pardoned and quashed convictions may be relevant to an assessment of a person’s suitability to work with children because of the surrounding factual circumstances in the particular case. Protecting children from any form of abuse is a matter of utmost importance for this government. The statistics tell us that the risk of abuse to children is significant. This bill will enhance the mechanisms in place to ensure that people who work with children are properly vetted. The Council of Australian Governments recognised that the assessment of criminal history is an integral aspect in making decisions about whether a person may pose a risk to children.

The bill implements the COAG commitment to enable the interjurisdictional exchange of expanded criminal history information for people working with children. This bill will enable organisations conducting working with children checks to consider the full criminal history of a person. This includes considering non-conviction information such as court records. The bill includes stringent safeguards to ensure that the information is dealt with appropriately and to limit any potential misuse of the information. We must take all steps to protect our children. This bill will enhance our overall strategy for managing risks to the safety and wellbeing of children. I commend the bill to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Ordered that this bill be reported to the House without amendment.