Stop the killing pleaded Maharey

The tragic death of 12-year-old Kelly Gush is another example of a child being failed by the system, despite promises by the Minister of an action plan to stop child deaths, says National Social Services Spokesperson Katherine Rich.

"Steve Maharey hasn't kept his promise to prevent "intolerable" child abuse deaths after the death of Mereana Edmonds (August 2000, Sunday News). "Child Youth and Family Service, the police and the Commissioner for Children were all aware of fears for the safety of Kelly and her sister yet none of the agencies intervened to make her safe.

"In August 2000, Steve Maharey announced he was setting up a high level group of Ministers determined to stop child abuse deaths. He has paid lip service to this promise.

"Given the vague answer the Minister has given to my Parliamentary question regarding the high level group of Ministers, I have doubts that they had had any substantive meetings at all. The job of the group has since been delegated to the chief executives.

"I am calling on the Minister to bring back the Ministers' group, and have them oversee the implementation of the recommendations in the Mick Brown report and the Jules Mikus Review.

"Otherwise we will just have more reports, blueprints, reviews and enquiries into these types of cases, but without the changes needed to prevent cases like that of Kelly Gush occurring again," says Mrs Rich.

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