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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 3 Hansard (27 March) . . Page.. 713 ..

MR STEFANIAK: The budget, of course, is audited. That has to occur, and the audit has to go to the department. In this case there were problems with that; so those have been addressed. To answer Mr Osborne's question, both the department and I are closely monitoring what happens at the youth centre, to ensure that the management committee now is, in fact, operating properly. It has recognised a number of shortfalls in terms of how it conducted its operation. It is responsible for running the centre and administering the budget. I am confident now that steps have been taken to ensure that things like this do not happen again. But, naturally, the department and I will be monitoring the situation very carefully.

MS FOLLETT: Mr Speaker, I direct a question to the Minister for Health and Community Care. It relates to the former staff of the Jindalee Nursing Home, so generously donated by Mrs Carnell to the private sector. I would ask in relation to those former staff: Minister, can you advise the Assembly how many of the casual staff, the permanent part-time staff and indeed the permanent full-time staff have been provided with jobs at Jindalee Nursing Home or alternatively with the ACT Government?

MRS CARNELL: As part of the tendering process there was a requirement for Johnson Village Services, the people that have bought Jindalee Nursing Home, to make offers of employment to the existing staff at Jindalee. Accordingly, Johnson Village Services advised staff of the positions that were available and sought expressions of interest from any staff who were interested in working for them. Approximately 20 staff have accepted offers of employment with Johnson Village Services, while approximately 55 of the other staff at Jindalee have elected to take voluntary redundancy packages, 40 will continue to work at Lower Jindalee and 20 have been redeployed elsewhere in the department.

MS FOLLETT: On a supplementary question, Mr Speaker: Would the Minister inform the Assembly of which of these staff have suffered a pay reduction as a result of their changed employment circumstances?

MRS CARNELL: I actually do not know what individual staff are being paid by the new contractor; but, obviously, they had a choice of taking employment with Johnson Village Services, taking a redundancy, taking redeployment or whatever. Ms Follett may have to go and ask Johnson Village Services what they are paying their staff, but I am sure that they are paying them in line with the award.

MS TUCKER: My question is to the Minister for Education and Training, Mr Stefaniak. Given that the schools development review process is one of the most important mechanisms available in the ACT government schools system for providing accountability by schools to parents and the community and for improving the performance of schools and given the importance of parent participation in this process, I ask the Minister why formal requirements for parent participation have been reduced through not continuing the subcommittee system, which used to involve at least 35 people.

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