Mr McCARTHY - 2015-04-30
Last week the ABC reported that the former Minister for Children and Families, the member for Araluen, said her CLP colleagues should restore youth services cut when the CLP came to power, but effective youth programs continue to be cut by your government.
Barkly Youth Services is being asked to run its successful youth diversion program with half the funding it had in the past. Why is restoring services for youth at risk such a low priority in the CLP Budget 2015-16?
Mr Deputy Speaker, I seek leave to table the document I am reading from.
Leave granted.
ANSWER
Mr Deputy Speaker, the best service a child can have is two loving parents, and this is consistently and assiduously avoided by the members opposite. I do not care what shape a family takes. One loving parent would be a good start in many instances, but two is good, maybe even three or four in the right arrangement. I do not make any presumptions about domestic relationships, but what about the idea of people looking after their kids? You never hear that from the members opposite. It is always the government’s fault when the government has to deal with some of the problem children we have in our community by virtue of neglectful parents. Never do we hear that, and I bang on about it relentlessly because that is the message we should be sending out, not only as a Territory government but as a federal government and a society. Look after your kids; it is your job when you are a parent.
Sadly, from time to time no matter how much you plead, beg, implore or ask parents to do that job they will not. When they engage in that type of neglectful activity, yes, the government steps in and has to do things like, unfortunately and too often, take children into care. We are doing this in increasing numbers because increasing numbers of parents on the welfare system are disengaging with their children and neglecting them 95% of the time and abusing them 4% of the time …
Mr McCARTHY: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker! Standing Order 113: relevance. Will the minister restore Barkly Youth Services’ funding, that has been reduced by half, to operate a successful diversion program?
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, member for Barkly. It was reasonably direct, minister. You still have a minute or so to come to the question.
Mr ELFERINK: Clearly I have to deal with some of the imputations and epithets he loaded the front end of the question with. If he wants a direct answer he should ask a direct question, not spray around the room with a machine gun and then say, ‘By the way, look at the goldfish’. I want to respond to what he has been doing with the machine gun, which is exactly what the Chief Minister described – being dishonest.
There is $4.2m extra in youth services this year across the Northern Territory. We continue to provide $172m to child protection services in the Northern Territory. We build schools and have programs through the police force which also reach out to the youth of the Northern Territory. There is any number of NGOs across the Northern Territory providing services. We are building childcare centres. We are continuing to provide health services for kids, and youth services through the suicide prevention action strategy we are rolling out. I could go on ad infinitum. We could provide those services ad infinitum, but we would not need to if parents did their job.
Barkly Youth Services is being asked to run its successful youth diversion program with half the funding it had in the past. Why is restoring services for youth at risk such a low priority in the CLP Budget 2015-16?
Mr Deputy Speaker, I seek leave to table the document I am reading from.
Leave granted.
ANSWER
Mr Deputy Speaker, the best service a child can have is two loving parents, and this is consistently and assiduously avoided by the members opposite. I do not care what shape a family takes. One loving parent would be a good start in many instances, but two is good, maybe even three or four in the right arrangement. I do not make any presumptions about domestic relationships, but what about the idea of people looking after their kids? You never hear that from the members opposite. It is always the government’s fault when the government has to deal with some of the problem children we have in our community by virtue of neglectful parents. Never do we hear that, and I bang on about it relentlessly because that is the message we should be sending out, not only as a Territory government but as a federal government and a society. Look after your kids; it is your job when you are a parent.
Sadly, from time to time no matter how much you plead, beg, implore or ask parents to do that job they will not. When they engage in that type of neglectful activity, yes, the government steps in and has to do things like, unfortunately and too often, take children into care. We are doing this in increasing numbers because increasing numbers of parents on the welfare system are disengaging with their children and neglecting them 95% of the time and abusing them 4% of the time …
Mr McCARTHY: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker! Standing Order 113: relevance. Will the minister restore Barkly Youth Services’ funding, that has been reduced by half, to operate a successful diversion program?
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, member for Barkly. It was reasonably direct, minister. You still have a minute or so to come to the question.
Mr ELFERINK: Clearly I have to deal with some of the imputations and epithets he loaded the front end of the question with. If he wants a direct answer he should ask a direct question, not spray around the room with a machine gun and then say, ‘By the way, look at the goldfish’. I want to respond to what he has been doing with the machine gun, which is exactly what the Chief Minister described – being dishonest.
There is $4.2m extra in youth services this year across the Northern Territory. We continue to provide $172m to child protection services in the Northern Territory. We build schools and have programs through the police force which also reach out to the youth of the Northern Territory. There is any number of NGOs across the Northern Territory providing services. We are building childcare centres. We are continuing to provide health services for kids, and youth services through the suicide prevention action strategy we are rolling out. I could go on ad infinitum. We could provide those services ad infinitum, but we would not need to if parents did their job.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016