Thursday, 11 September 2025

Disability services

Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (12:31): My question is for the Minister for Disability. Recommendation 11.3 of the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability was to:

… establish or maintain an independent ‘one-stop shop’ complaint reporting, referral and support mechanism to receive reports of violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation of people with disability.

It was not to establish an authority that also deals with other social service complaints as you have done. Why have you included the disability complaints process into the role of the wider social services regulator, which is not a standalone disability complaints entity, as recommended?

Lizzie BLANDTHORN (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Children, Minister for Disability) (12:32): I thank Ms Bath for her question. She is conflating two very important issues there. The first is the national disability royal commission, which did make recommendations about the importance of an independent commission nationally consistent across the country, and as part of the national disability reform ministerial council we remain in discussion about those. Sadly, I will again take the opportunity to say that the Commonwealth has not bothered in recent times to actually call a meeting of the disability reform ministers council and is out there announcing things like Thriving Kids without actually even talking to those who are the co-governors of the scheme, and it is extremely frustrating. But I will deal with the second and unrelated part of Ms Bath’s question, which speaks to our plan. It has not yet actually been enacted, so it has not actually happened, Ms Bath, but it is certainly part of our agenda to ensure that the social services regulation landscape in this state is cohesive, and that is –

Melina Bath interjected.

Lizzie BLANDTHORN: Sorry, President, if I am constantly interrupted, it is impossible to answer the question.

The PRESIDENT: The minister, without any interruption.

Lizzie BLANDTHORN: So I am extremely committed, I remain committed, and indeed our statements and response to the child safety review reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that we have a social services regulator that is able to bring together all elements of ensuring that we provide effective regulation and a one-stop shop complaints mechanism as well as a place in which people can make one approach when it comes to the regulation of social services. It is particularly important, as we all know and have all agreed in this chamber in recent weeks, when it comes to children, including children with disability but all children, that our social services regulatory system is coordinated and they speak to each other and we ensure that whether people are using social services in relation to housing, in relation to disability, in relation to out-of-home care or in relation to other children’s services it is all in a coherent, cohesive and structured way under one regulator that ensures the intersectionality of people’s complex lives are reflected in the services that are there to provide for them and in the way in which they are regulated. We remain absolutely committed to the proposal. I would remind everyone in this house that they have also, in recent weeks, committed to supporting those reforms, which will go to improving child safety.

Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (12:34): Minister, the same recommendation states the service ‘should be co-designed with people with disability’. Why were none of the six member groups of Disabled People’s Organisations Victoria not consulted in line with the recommendation?

Lizzie BLANDTHORN (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Children, Minister for Disability) (12:35): I am now unclear whether Ms Bath is talking about the national *Disability Royal Commission or indeed our proposal in relation to the social services regulator, because two completely different issues have been conflated in the substantive question and then again in the supplementary question. But I will assure Ms Bath that we remain absolutely committed, as we hope the Commonwealth do, to co-design and ensuring that the voices of people with lived experience are reflected in the way we, one, establish an independent national –

Melina Bath: On a point of order, President: Minister, have you consulted with the six-member Disabled People’s Organisation Group?

Members interjecting.

Melina Bath: The minister is not answering the question. I ask you to bring her back to the question.

The PRESIDENT: I believe there was a point of order, but I also believe the minister was being relevant to the question.

Lizzie BLANDTHORN: Thank you, President. I would just point out it is not a point of order to ask the question again just because you have not clearly understood what it is that we are actually talking about in either providing for the substantive or the supplementary. But I would assure the house that we are absolutely committed to working with people with disability to ensure that our negotiations with the Commonwealth reflect their needs when it comes to disability reform across the country, including when it comes to things like safeguarding and independent regulation. And we are absolutely committed to it when it comes to our own reforms, particularly those in relation to protecting children and child safety, including children with disabilities. If you are not, then you should take that somewhere else.