Street Maryan: Education Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Street Maryan: Education Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:662;Page:10642] 
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour) 
: 
 In speaking to Part 2 of the Education Amendment Bill I will highlight the transitional provision in relation to police vetting. The Education and Science Committee spent some time as I understand it considering the matter of police vetting. There is a provision in Part 1 new section 78CB(2) that states: “The board of a State school or the management of a school registered under section 35A that is required … to obtain a Police vet of a person must apply for the vet no later than 2 weeks after the person begins work at the school.” That amendment to the Act came about as a recommendation from the Education and Science Committee. Its members had determined that the previous amount of time was too long and it needed to be shortened so that a police vet would occur within at least 2 weeks of non-teaching staff starting work and that has been incorporated in the legislation. 
Part 2 contains a transitional provision and I would be interested to know from the Minister of Education what kinds of provisions will be put in place to allow this clause to be implemented. Clause 76 “Transitional provision in relation to Police” states: “the board of a State school or the management of a school registered under section 35A or a service provider of a licensed early childhood service (as the case may be) must within 4 weeks after the date on which this Act comes into force apply for a Police vet of any person in respect of whom—(a) a Police vet is required … and (b) no Police vet has been obtained within a period of 3 years immediately before the commencement of this Act”. In other words it is a tidying-up clause that requires schools to initiate the process of police vetting within a period of 4 weeks after the date on which this legislation comes into force. 
The question I have for the Minister of Education is: what consideration has been given to the communication strategy that is required in order for this to happen? Clearly the Ministry of Education I presume will be communicating with every school immediately after the passage of this legislation. This legislation will pass in due course because Labour is supporting it despite our disappointment at the non-inclusion of some clauses that we were particularly keen on. However it will pass and I trust that there will be some communication to the schools and institutions that draws their attention with some sense of immediacy to the need to apply for a police vet of any person particularly where no police vet has been obtained within a period of 3 years immediately before the commencement of the Act. So these are tidying-up provisions to make sure all the police vetting processes are in order. 
Although I am sure the Minister can answer the question quite readily this is still an important consideration and it is one of those parts of legislation that sometimes do not receive a lot of attention but for the assiduousness of officials who are obliged to draw this to the attention of schools. Obviously in this instance a vet is not an animal doctor nor is it even an animal doctor who looks after police dogs but it is a process of scrutiny and assessment of the fitness of people—teaching and non-teaching staff—who have access to children in our schools and early childhood education centres. 
Nothing could be more important than the fitness of both teaching and non-teaching staff to be in contact with children right up to the age of exit from secondary school in a teaching or non-teaching capacity. So the transitional provision requires some assiduous application of the ministry to advertise this provision to schools in order that they comply. In fact the Education and Science Committee thought this was so important that it reduced the time from the 8 weeks that was in the legislation in its first iteration to 4 weeks. That requires even speedier compliance than was originally envisaged by the Minister. I presume from the Minister’s nodding a moment ago that she is very much in favour of this shortened time frame. I assume that her instruction will be very clear to officials to ensure that not only are the usual communication channels followed—the gazetting and things of that sort—but also there might even be additional communication to principals and boards of trustees that this requirement needs to be complied with within 4 weeks. That is a reasonably short order but it is one of the essential components if we are to keep our learning institutions—our early childhood education centres and our primary and secondary schools—safe for the children who attend them. 
The shortening of the period contained in this transitional provision is a good move by the Education and Science Committee. Obviously it has perceived the urgency of this provision and the urgency of the issue behind it. There is nothing more important than the safety of the children in our schools and early childhood education centres and the process of establishing the fitness of people who come into contact with them—not simply teaching staff but also non-teaching staff—must be paramount. So the process that determines the fitness of those people needs to be enacted it needs to be complied with and it needs to be satisfied in every letter and every respect. 
The transitional provision in relation to police vetting is an essential part of Part 2. My colleagues may well speak to other parts of Part 2 but it seems to me that it is appropriate to draw the attention of the Committee to the importance of even a simple transitional provision. It is something that every principal of every school and every chair of every board of trustees needs to know about so that they can ensure compliance within the shortened time frame. As I say Labour supports having a shortened time frame for this compliance period and supports this transitional provision not only for its mechanics but obviously for its greater import and purpose in protecting the safety of children in our schools. 
I support these provisions together with the provisions of Part 1 which deal not only with the appropriateness of teaching staff but the police vetting of non-teaching and unregistered employees and the police vetting of contractors and their employees. Thank you.