Parents urged to reach out to police after alleged childcare centre abuse
By Cloe Read
Parents who are panicked about recent news of an alleged paedophile in Brisbane and Sydney childcare centres have been urged to speak with their child about grooming, or come to police if they have critical information about the case.
The comments were made by top Queensland authorities days after police revealed a 45-year-old Gold Coast man had been arrested on more than 1600 child abuse offences relating to 91 young girls, allegedly committed at 10 childcare centres in Brisbane, and one in Sydney.
The Australian Federal Police said the man had all the necessary qualifications for his job as a childcare worker, but his alleged offending, stretching back to 2007, went undetected.
Early Childhood Australia said there needed to be a national working-with-children check system and consistent thresholds across jurisdictions that provide stronger safeguarding of children.
“Concerns or allegations may not meet the threshold for police intervention or charges to be laid, but the cumulative risk should trigger protections – people who are repeatedly identified as a risk should not continue to work with children or vulnerable people,” ECA’s chief executive Samantha Page said.
“This means allowing evidence to build over time and across jurisdictions rather than only in relation to a single case.”
Queensland Police Minister Mark Ryan on Thursday said the community needed to be ever-vigilant.
“I think it’s very well appreciated that this was a very heinous offender who was very deceptive about his offending and thank goodness we’ve got the expert police, not only here in Queensland, but around Australia, who were able to detect his offending when they did,” Ryan said.
But he said he understood, being a parent of small boys, how parents were concerned about how they could approach the topic with their children.
He said it was the role of a parent to “make sure that they protect their kids”.
“And part of that is having the conversation with your kids about how to keep them safe,” he said.
QPS Acting Deputy Commissioner Mark Wheeler said it had been a painstaking investigation.
“What I’d say to parents, if they’ve got concerns, they absolutely need to come to police. Tell us what they know, tell us what their concerns are,” he said.
“That has been a mammoth investigation across different agencies and I commend all the police and agencies that have been involved in that operation. But anyone who has concerns, please come forward to the police as soon as possible.”
He said while it may be an uncomfortable conversation, he strongly urged parents to talk to their children to prevent crimes against them.
“The conversations you have with your children are really important at the earliest stage possible.
“What we say is crime prevention starts in the home...we don’t want young people to become victims.”
Childcare bodies have raised concerns about the protection of young children, while Queensland’s Opposition party criticised the state’s blue card system, claiming the government had failed to implement 53 recommendations after the death of school girl Tiahleigh Palmer in 2017.
“It is devastating that the existing safeguards were not enough to prevent or deter abuse - and that this has caused significant lasting harm,” Page said.