Child Protection (Working with Children) Amendment (Miscellaneous) Regulation 2013 (NSW)

 On Friday, the NSW Government passed the Child Protection (Working with Children) Amendment (Miscellaneous) Regulation 2013 (No. 676 of 2013).

This regulation affects medical professionals as well as all other professions dealing with children on a daily basis and the regulation aims to:

• amend Schedule 2 to the Child Protection (Working with Children) Act 2012 to include convictions for former offences relating to carnal knowledge (the relevant provisions were repealed in 1986) as mandatory grounds on which working with children check clearances (clearances) must be refused and to make a related transitional regulation,
• correct a reference to an offence in that Schedule,
• to prescribe school cleaners as persons who are engaged in child-related work and who are required to have clearances and to provide for the staged application of clearance requirements to school cleaners,
• to enable authorised carers, and persons residing with them, who reside in another State or a Territory, and authorised carers, and persons residing with them or at homes where home based education and child care services or family day care services are provided, who have physical difficulties, to provide proof of identity for the purposes of a clearance application in the manner approved by the Children’s Guardian rather than in person at a motor vehicle registry or Government Access Centre,
• to make it clear that persons who reside with authorised carers who provide out-of-home care are exempt from the requirement to have a clearance if the authorised carers only provide the care at a place other than the home,
• to exempt birth parents who reside with authorised carers of their children from the requirement to have a clearance,
• to exempt authorised carers who reside outside Australia, and adults who reside with them, from the Child Protection (Working with Children) Act 2012, unless they return to Australia for a period of more than 7 days,
• to adjust the periods for compliance by volunteers, existing workers and others with the requirements of the Child Protection (Working with Children) Act 2012 so that the relevant periods end on 31 March rather than 31 December,
• to enable the Children’s Guardian to require any person who is subject to the staged implementation of clearance requirements to comply with those requirements within an earlier specified period.

This Regulation is made under the Child Protection (Working with Children) Act 2012, including sections 6 (3) (g), 13 (4) and 52 (the general regulation-making power).

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