Public Guardian Act 2014

A community visitor (child) has the following functions relating to a child under care staying at a visitable home or a child staying at a visitable site—

to develop a trusting and supportive relationship with the child, so far as is possible;

to advocate on behalf of the child by listening to, giving voice to, and facilitating the resolution of, the child’s concerns and grievances;

to seek information about, and facilitate access by the child to, support services appropriate to the child’s needs provided by service providers;

to inquire into and report on the adequacy of information given to the child about the child’s rights;

to inquire into and report on the physical and emotional wellbeing of the child;

for a visitable home—

to inspect the home and report on its appropriateness for the accommodation of the child; and

to ensure the child’s needs are being met by persons caring for the child at the home;

for a visitable site—

to inspect the site and report on its appropriateness for the accommodation of the child or the delivery of services to the child, having regard to relevant State and Commonwealth laws, policies and standards; and

to ensure the child’s needs are being met by staff members at the site;

at the request of the public guardian, to inquire into and report on any other matter relating to a child under care staying at a visitable home or a child staying at a visitable site.

A community visitor (child) may perform any other child advocate function if directed by the public guardian.

A community visitor (child) also has the function of giving advice and reports to the public guardian about anything relating to the visitor’s functions and powers.

Without limiting subsection (1)(b), the function of a community visitor (child) mentioned in that subsection includes referring a matter in relation to a child’s concerns and grievances to the NDIS commissioner if the visitor considers the NDIS commissioner has functions in relation to the matter.

If a community visitor (child) reasonably considers that the visitor can discharge the visitor’s functions or a particular function by contacting a child or someone else at a visitable home or visitable site by using relevant technology, the visitor may discharge the functions or function in that way.

In this section—