Page 2670 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 28 June 2011
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occasions and has carefully considered all 133 recommendations. I am advised that already many of the individual responses to the recommendations are being completed, which reflects the commitment of the AMC task force and the staff that have been charged with giving effect to the actions identified.
I think it is important to remind the Assembly that Knowledge Consulting made many positive findings. The first report acknowledged that establishing a correctional centre presents many challenges. As this report states:
The enormity of this challenge should not be underestimated given the inherent highly complex, problematic and at times dangerous nature of correctional centres …
This report finds that the AMC has fared favourably when compared to other new prisons being established.
I know that the opposition thinks it is irrelevant to describe the absence of a negative as a positive, but in this context I believe it is well worth recording that no such serious incidents have transpired in the post-commissioning phase of the AMC. The government is proud of this, and it is a pleasing outcome for our community.
Mr Hamburger identified many areas where the AMC is best practice. This continues to be an endorsement of the commitment of ACT Corrective Services staff and the government as a whole. Whilst we remain proud of what we have achieved to date, we know there is more to do and in such a difficult and complex operation this must be expected. Many of the recommendations are not quick fixes, and we will stand up and acknowledge that. That being said, we will not sweep them under the carpet either. As a good government, we will seek to continue to address a number of areas for improvement. Some will be easy to address; others will take more time.
The AMC task force have spent a good amount of time discussing the best way to bring forward solutions and they have discussed at some length the need for collaboration and cooperation.
The Corrective Services area of my directorate will clearly need to collaborate with various other government and non-government bodies. Indeed this is already happening. As an example, there are a number of recommendations that have health-related implications. There are also a number of recommendations with themes in common with recommendations of the Burnet Institute report on drug services at the AMC. The AMC task force have already, via the Executive Director of ACT Corrective Services and other senior staff, instigated communication with the Health Directorate with a view to getting on and addressing these issues. Indeed, as a result of this collaboration, some of the recommendations arising from both reports have already been completed.
Corrective Services will continue to address issues arising from the recommendations in multi-agency fora, including the Joint Government-Community Integration Governance Group. Planning to ensure appropriate consultation with other external stakeholders on specific recommendations is also well underway. It is important to ensure that we include and consider the views of our many stakeholders, whether they
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