The NSW Liberals and Nationals are demanding answers from the Premier after further reports show the Minister for Families and Communities had direct involvement in the payment of nearly $40,000 of taxpayers\u2019 money to an NGO so it would drop legal action against a former foster carer with ties to the Labor Party.
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Shadow Minister for Families and Communities Natasha Maclaren\u2011Jones said reports that NGO staff were directed to remove references to the Minister from correspondence, and a non\u2011disclosure agreement was drawn up, raise serious questions about what the Minister was trying to hide and suggest a deliberate effort to conceal her role.
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\u201cThis was not a routine decision. Minister Washington overruled her own department and presided over a process to hide her role. This stinks to high heaven,\u201d Mrs Maclaren\u2011Jones said.
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\u201cIt has all the hallmarks of a cover\u2011up.\u201d
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\u201cThe public deserves straight answers. Were records altered? Was the NGO pressured? And why was ministerial intervention required at all?\u201d Mrs Maclaren\u2011Jones said.
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Mrs Maclaren-Jones said the Premier must answer these questions and explain why he continues to shield Minister Washington from accountability.
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\u201cWhen experienced stakeholders are warning that a Minister has misused her authority, Chris Minns cannot simply look the other way, Mrs Maclaren-Jones said.
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\u201cChris Minns must explain why the public is only learning about this now. The public deserves transparency, but instead they get secret payouts, children placed with dangerous offenders, and welfare reports closed without kids even being seen.\u201d
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\u201cThe Minister has blamed her department for every disaster on her watch, children living with a serial killer, ROSH reports closed because there\u2019s \u2018no capacity to allocate\u2019, kids not even being seen before their welfare reports are shut down. Not this time.\u201d
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\u201cThis payout was her call, her signature, her responsibility, and she has serious questions to answer about her judgment, transparency and integrity.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The NSW Liberals and Nationals are demanding answers from the Premier after further reports show the Minister for Families and Communities had direct involvement in the payment of nearly $40,000 of taxpayers\u2019 money to an NGO so it would drop legal action against a former foster carer with ties to the Labor Party.\u00a0Shadow Minister for … Continue reading “Minister must explain her role in payout”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nswnews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40069"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40069\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40070,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40069\/revisions\/40070"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}