Wednesday, 25 May 2022

Foster carers

Dr BACH (Eastern Metropolitan) (17:32): (1934) My adjournment matter tonight is for the Minister for Child Protection and Family Services, and the action that I seek is for him to release the KPMG report into funding for foster carers and also a government response. I was deeply troubled following the release of the budget about the manner in which so many issues to do with our most vulnerable children were not addressed. I was only more troubled after listening to what occurred at the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee the other day.

Foster carers are some of the most meritorious people in our state, doing wonderful work with vulnerable Victorian children, and yet the foster carers allowance has not gone up a single cent since 2016. We are all aware that cost-of-living pressures are spiralling right now. We can all see the price at the bowser. We all know how expensive it is to buy steak these days. Foster carers have these same cost-of-living pressures, and yet Victoria is the only state that does not even index the foster carer allowance, so it has not gone up a cent since 2016. Before the budget I joined the Foster Carer Association of Victoria in calling on the government to rectify this glaring problem. However, nothing was done; once again nothing was done.

Questions were asked by the coalition team at the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee about whether or not an increase in the foster carer allowance had been recommended by KPMG, who the government had do a review of support for foster carers. Minister Carbines did a very bad job of fudging his responses. It is utterly clear that KPMG has recommended an increase in the foster carer allowance. So now the minister must release the report—I trust he has read it; I hope he has read it—and a response from the government, because foster carers contact me every day. The level of disrespect that they feel as a result of the government’s persistent refusal to deal with their core request, an increase in the foster carer allowance, is palpable, but there were broader issues in this budget regarding how we should be treating the most vulnerable children in our state that I would like to briefly touch upon in the time that I have left.

At the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee the minister lauded himself and his department for their carer strategy. This strategy was released by Minister Donnellan three child protection ministers ago, in October 2019. Not one action from the carer strategy has been successfully achieved. Not one single cent has gone behind the carer strategy. So I confess I was dumbstruck, as so many carers were who have contacted me, that the minister had the front to pat himself on the back and the Andrews Labor government on the back for the wonderful work they have done in putting in place the carer strategy. The strategy is fine. It must be funded, and foster carers in our state must finally be shown the respect they deserve by the Andrews Labor government.