Child Protection Minister Katrine Hildyard gives her department boss 12-month action order
The executive order approach is not just for Washington DC – this South Australian minister is giving it a crack from North Terrace.
SA News
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The state’s Child Protection Minister is attempting to get around a roadblock on new child safety laws by issuing a President Trump-style directive to her department.
Katrine Hildyard has written to Department for Child Protection boss Jackie Bray setting out key reforms she wants action on over the next year – and requiring monthly reports on progress.
The reforms are among a suite of changes proposed in legislation currently before parliament, but the government faces strong opposition on a crucial point.
Last week The Advertiser reported that the Children and Young People (Safety and Support) Bill, which took years to develop, would be abandoned by government if it was forced to compromise.
Amid the deadlock Ms Hildyard has now asked her department to move ahead with a range of changes which do not technically require a change of the law to implement.
“While others continue to play political games with child protection and family support policy I will get on with implementing these important measures,” she told The Advertiser.
The move channels US President Donald Trump’s use of executive orders to enact changes without passing legislation.
Mr Trump signed about 220 of these unilateral orders, which have the force of law, in his first term in office and issued a flurry of new orders since returning to the White House in late January.
Greens MLC Tammy Franks said crossbench and opposition MPs were urging Ms Hildyard to “take pause and reflect before reacting in the way that she has”.
“We govern by parliament, not executive orders, in South Australia,” Ms Franks said.
“The crossbench and opposition have listened to the stakeholders and the minister has not.”
The proposed South Australian laws, which underwent extensive consultation, will cover every child in SA, from those at risk of harm in their homes to those already living in state care.
The sticking point between government and the opposition and crossbench MPs is whether the top priority for workers making decisions about at-risk children should be that they are “safe and protected from harm” or their broader “best interests”, which would include their desires, emotional wellbeing and connection with family.
Two children’s commissioners, the guardian for children in care, MPs and a string of welfare and legal organisations have lobbied the government to change to best interests, but Ms Hildyard has declared she will “not back away at all” from keeping safety as the top priority.
She has confirmed that it the parliament votes to shift to best interests the government will abandon the Bill and revert to laws passed in 2017, which all parties agree need major updating.
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