Economy
The Forgotten Coast …
Human Services Minister Jacquie Petrusma takes ‘full responsibility’ for child protection failure but will not resign
Tasmania’s Human Services Minister has taken full responsibility for a serious child protection failure, but has no intention of standing down.
For a second day, Jacquie Petrusma faced a barrage of questions from Labor and the Greens about the ”epic failure” and the reasons why she was not informed about it for weeks after it was uncovered.
At the end of July, the department discovered notifications about 151 children and babies in the North West had been ignored.
Mrs Petrusma said they had all now been assessed and none had been classified as priority one cases.
On Monday, when she was finally briefed about the issue, she ordered an urgent report which will consider if any children suffered as a result.
I take full responsibility for this situation because ultimately the buck sticks with me.
Mrs Petrusma could not say when the report will be handed down but said she would refuse to resign even if it finds children were harmed as a result of child protection’s delay in intervening.
• William Boeder in Comments: When the news broke about the numbers of ignored calls for assistance, the way it all reads suggests that our DHHS minister says I’ll take the responsibility for this failure. This acceptance of responsibility effectively says ‘okay apparently this has happened on my watch and I will look to deal with what is required to take the heat off myself. What this will likely create in the upcoming weeks is a snip (a redirection of allocated funds) from some sector or department of health services that hasn’t racked up a significant deficiency of services, then slip that across to child care, next a media release that praises the prompt response by our DHHS minister, thus look at how quick I can fix any problems in my portfolio.