Page 3092 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 16 September 2015
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The Council on the Ageing have also expressed interest in the approach, requesting a briefing on the local services network, as they seek to improve community wellbeing for older people in Ainslie and Weston. The willingness of people who work on the ground to engage with this model gives me added confidence in the value of structuring services where we can around the needs and wishes of local people.
Elsewhere in our better services program, strengthening families is attracting interest among other human services keen to engage with this family-centred approach to case management; for example, the capital health network, working around integrated responses for families affected by mental illness, and the National Disability Insurance Agency to help families overcome any barriers to getting the supports they need under the NDIS. Further afield, the Tasmanian Department of Health and Human Services recently visited the ACT to learn from these approaches and continue to work on adapting our work into their own communities.
MADAM SPEAKER: A supplementary question, Dr Bourke.
DR BOURKE: Minister, what evidence is emerging about the project through the government’s evaluation process?
MS BERRY: The better services initiatives are being evaluated to show how they are making a difference to people’s lives. The government is working with the University of Canberra on an extensive evaluation framework so that as these initiatives go forward they are backed up by a strong evidence base.
Early evidence from the local services network in west Belconnen is showing remarkable levels of commitment from service providers including government, non-government and business. This commitment is reflected in positive working relationships and the goodwill to support each other and ensure that existing services are working in an integrated way. The commitment to community is an example of this, where the whole community has come together to identify the priorities and to work together to create local solutions.
This commitment has been in some of the comments from some of our network partners. Here is a quote from one of them:
Collaboration between services is not new in West Belconnen … We have always been involved at the ground level and working with our connections … however we might not have been very successful in the past …
The government believe we can capitalise on this local leadership and we will achieve more successful collaborative practices to benefit all of those who rely on local community services.
Schools—autism
MR WALL: My question is to the minister for education. Minister, since a cage was removed from an ACT primary school, where was it taken and where is it now?
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