Question Without Notice No. 792 asked in the Legislative Council on 7 November 2017 by Hon Alison Xamon
Parliament: 40 Session: 1
COURT SECURITY AND CUSTODIAL SERVICES — 2016–17 ANNUAL REPORT
792. Hon ALISON XAMON to the minister representing the Minister for Corrective Services:
I refer to the 2016–17 annual report ''Contract for the Provision of Court Security and Custodial Services'', and to the increase in incidents subject to abatement following transfer of these services from Serco to Broadspectrum.
(1) Is the minister aware of the significant increase in incidents since Broadspectrum took over the contract?
(2) If yes to (1), has the minister taken any action regarding this issue?
(3) If yes to (2), what action has been taken?
(4) Is the minister considering cancelling Broadspectrum's contract because of the unacceptably high numbers of incidents since Broadspectrum began providing this service?
(5) If no to (4), why not?
Hon STEPHEN DAWSON replied:
I thank the honourable member for some notice of the question.
The minister advises as follows.
(1)–(2) Yes.
(3) The Department of Justice has applied abatements to each incident, and the contractor was required to implement corrective action to prevent the recurrence of incidents.
(4) No. However, the minister has requested the department to closely monitor all contracted services to ensure compliance, and to apply abatements and issue improvement notices where applicable.
(5) A higher level of incidents occurred in 2011–12 in the first year of operation for the previous contractor. The Department of Justice will continue to monitor incidents under the contract and apply abatements where applicable.