Report into Child Protection Department’s bungled handling of sexual abuse cases to be released on Tuesday
A report into how officials handled the sexual abuse of two children in state care will be made public on Tuesday.
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A report into the Child Protection Department’s mishandling of the sexual abuse of two children in state care will be made public on Tuesday.
The State Government considered the report for a second time on Monday and confirmed it would release it the following day.
The Opposition has slammed the Government for delaying the release of the review, and renewed its call for it to be immediately made public.
An inquiry, led by former judge Paul Rice and known as the Rice Review, was launched in December after it was revealed two 13-year-old girls in state care fell pregnant to paedophiles. Child Protection Minister Rachel Sanderson was unaware of the cases until two men were convicted and sentenced for sexually abusing the children.
Mr Rice handed his report into the Department’s policies and procedures to the Government last Tuesday.
His investigation also looked into how staff report alleged criminal conduct against a child in care; whether those policies were in line with past inquiries; the failure to inform Ms Sanderson of two cases; and disciplinary measures for staff who failed to report.
Cabinet first considered the findings and recommendations on Thursday.
Premier Steven Marshall at the time said the report would be further reviewed “to make sure that any specific sensitive references to any of the two vulnerable people included in that report have been redacted” before it would be released.
Opposition child protection spokeswoman Katrine Hildyard said releasing the full report, with the girls’ names redacted, should be “treated with the utmost urgency”.
“Instead, we have seen delays, a lack of commitment to releasing the report in full and, bizarrely, a ‘review of the review’,” she said.
Ms Hildyard it was “unacceptable that is it now a week since the Government received the Rice Review and it has still not been made public”.
In September, Matthew McIntrye, 35, was jailed for two years for abusing and impregnating a 13-year-old girl in state care.
McIntyre groomed the girl via a dating app.
The Child Protection Department amended its reporting policies in response to Ms Sanderson revealing she was not aware of the case until after McIntrye was sentenced.
However, three months later, Philip Edwin McIntosh was sentenced to more than six years in jail for maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with a 13-year-old girl, also in state care, and Ms Sanderson was yet again unaware of the case. The court heard McIntosh met the girl in a Hindley St nightclub.
In 2016, the Nyland royal commission report into the child protection system was handed to the then-Labor Government on a Friday and was released the following Monday.
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