CEO of the Department of Local Government and Communities and the Young Men's Christian Association of Perth Inc.: Inadequate Supervision (breach of s.165)

On 23 February 2017 the West Australian State Administrative Tribunal (SAT) made an order which gave effect to the terms of settlement holding that on 30 September 2016 the YMCA contravened s.165(1), National Law by failing to ensure that all children being educated and cared for by the service were adequately supervised at all times the children were in the care of that service and imposed a penalty of $15,000.

The full decision and statement of the agreed facts can be found on the SAT website. However, in brief, the case concerned YMCA as the operator (approved provider) of YMCA St John of God Vacation Care. In September 2016 the service conducted an excursion to a wildlife park. A bus was chartered for the excursion. At the end of the excursion the bus returned to the service and dropped the children off and then left to pick up some other children, from another service, from the zoo. At that time a child from the (previous) service was found asleep on the bus (about 15 minutes after the bus had departed the service). The service failed to do a headcount, as per YMCA policy, or check the bus.

By way of explanation, in WA rather than prosecute in a court (as is the case with other States and Territories) certain breaches of the National Law may be heard by the State Administrative Tribunal as a disciplinary action under s.188B of the Schedule to the Education and Care Services National Law (WA) Act 2012.