Legal/ethics

Question 1

Policies and procedures include the following information:

(general, and “key information”

Answer 1

Information about:
How the service must function;
The roles and responsibilities of all key staff members; The systems regarding governance and coordination of the organisation;
Governance and management;

Cover key information such as:
• Human resources;
• Employee roles, rights and responsibilities;
• Service user rights and responsibilities;
• Workplace health and safety and risk assessment;
• Quality assurance and audit compliance;
• Safeguards and freedom from assault, abuse, neglect and exploitation;
• Conflict of interest;
• Confidentiality and privacy;
• Complaints and feedback.

Dependent on the type of human service organisation (e.g. aged care, disability, youth, domestic and family violence, mental health), there could also be various other types of policies and procedures.

Question 2

Primary purposes of policies:

Answer 2

Explain to anyone employed by, involved with, or interested in a service provider:
The way the service operates;
The key operational procedures;
How the service complies with any legislation, funding or department obligations.

Policies must always be reflective of industry best practice and should be current and operational.

Question 3

Ways for organisations to ensure that their policies are appropriate to the needs of their service users, staff and general service requirements:
(5 things)

Answer 3

Liaising with auditors
(regarding P+P appropriateness and discussing methods of review and mechanisms to update policies as a result of feedback received from audit).

Requesting feedback
(from service users, their informal support networks, staff and anyone associated with the service).

Providing training regarding P+P
(to staff and anyone else for whom training might be helpful).

Attending industry network events and discussing policy and procedure with other industry professionals.

Conducting regular reviews of P+P
(and providing information about any changes to all who are associated with the service provider).

Question 4

Staff/employee role regarding policy and procedure development is to:
(5 things)

Answer 4

Recognise feedback and pass it on and/or record it appropriately;

Encourage anyone in the organisation to utilise feedback mechanisms for the purpose of passing on information which could be used for policy review;

Participate in any requests from anyone in the service to review policies, procedures or workplace documents;

Ensure you are aware of the policy framework of the organisation and that you’re familiar with the policies and procedures which are related to your role and the responsibilities you have;

Complete workplace documents in a manner which is conducive with policy and procedure frameworks and provide feedback to a relevant person if you find any specific stipulations to be unrealistic or unachievable.
(examples: you cannot complete a task within the timeframe stipulated by policy, or a required confidentiality consent form is not provided in a certain language for a specific client group)

Question 5

(5) Ways to understand best practice:

Answer 5

Become involved in industry reference groups;
Attend networking events;
Participate in functions held by other service providers; Attend professional development, training and up-skilling opportunities;
Sector websites have up-to-date information regarding sector practice, templates, audit tools and general information to help individuals and organisations remain well informed and current.

Question 6

Common law is:

Answer 6

Judge-made law, which is determined by individual matters heard in a court room.
Common laws are rules which are not yet included within legislation: therefore, enforceable by the threat of litigation.
Ie: can sue for, but police won’t arrest for (unless there’s a component which breaches the legislation).

Question 7

Example of common law:

Answer 7

Duty of care:
the responsibility that everyone owes to all others to ensure that our actions or omissions don’t adversely affect the safety or wellbeing of another person.

This particular responsibility is stipulated in some pieces of legislation which relate to particular groups of people (such as police, paramedics etc), but is not stipulated generally in a piece of legislation which relates to all people in all jobs.

Question 8

Duty of care is a balancing act of:

Answer 8

Legal - What does the law suggest we do?
Professional/ethical - What do other workers expect us to do?
Organisational - What does our organisation, and its funding body, say we should do?
Community - What do clients/family and other community members expect us to do?
Personal - What do our own beliefs and values suggest we do?

Balance the safety of the client against:
The safety of other people/our personal safety
Other rights of the client (e.g. the right to privacy)
The aims of the service (e.g. to empower young people)
The limits of our organisation (eg. $ and other resources)

Question 9

The key components of most human rights and human services based legislation:

Answer 9

to direct, protect and inform

Direction : the stipulations and requirements which are set by this particular piece of legislation which affect a particular person, group of people, organisation or Department.

Protection: the way this statute will safeguard a particular person, group or people, organisation or Department.

Informing: the general information that this Act will provide in addition to the mechanisms regarding direction and protection.

Question 10

The following Acts relate to all areas of human/community services and are essential to understand and be aware of:

Answer 10

Privacy Act 1988  (CTH);
    Information Privacy Act 2009  (QLD);
    Work Health and Safety Act 2011  (QLD);
    Guardianship and Administration Act 2000  (QLD);
    Anti-Discrimination Act 1991  (QLD);
    Community Services Act 1997  (QLD);
    QCAT Act  (QLD);
    Public Guardian Act 2014  (QLD

Question 11

If you work, or what to work with people with a disability, then the following Acts are most likely to be relevant to you:

Answer 11

Disability Services Act 2006 (QLD);
Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (CTH);
Forensic Disability Act 2011 (QLD

Question 12

State Vs Commonwealth legislation and convention :

Answer 12

When State legislation contradicts Commonwealth legislation, the Commonwealth legislation will win, but only to the extent of the inconsistency, or contradiction.

When writing legislation, it’s preferred that a certain ‘convention’ be used to keep it consistent and easy to read. You will notice that the name of the Act and the year are all written in italics, then the State or Commonwealth is in brackets after the name and not italicized. Writing legislation in this manner will make your work appear more professional and is a more appropriate method to use in the workplace.

Question 13

United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities:

Answer 13

This convention is an international human rights treaty of the United Nations intended to recognize ‘all human rights and fundamental freedoms and the need for persons with disabilities to be guaranteed their full enjoyment without discrimination.’

Question 14

United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child:

Answer 14

This convention is an international human rights treaty that outlines a child’s distinct rights as human beings. It conveys an international commitment to the advancement of children’s rights.

Question 15

Human rights issues affecting people with a disability:

Answer 15

of 541 survey responses:

Participation and inclusion in society (15.75%*, 217**)
Work and employment (13.49%, 193)
Access to services (8.57%, 131)
Welfare and social security (8.25%, 105)
Health and safety (8.14%, 104)
Negative attitudes and stereotyping (7.79%, 115)
NDIS roll-out (7.22%, 99)
Education (6.09%, 84)
Violence, abuse and neglect (5.42%, 73)
Housing (5.17%, 76)
Living independently (3.82%, 61)
Access to justice (3.43%, 50)
Reasonable adjustments/accommodations (2.65%, 42)
Other (2.16%, 31)
Transport (1.95%, 29)
Assistance animals (0.11%, 3)

Question 16

Access based issues for people with a disability can include:

Answer 16

Inability for a person with a physical disability to get into their local bank due to the absence of stairs or a lift;
Lack of access to the criminal and civil judicial system;
Lack of access to relevant communities, such as respective cultural communities, social and recreational communities;
Lack of access to public transport;
Lack of access to sporting events, festivals and various other community events;
Lack of seating at movie theatres, concerts and restaurants for people using wheelchairs;
Lack of access to employment;
Lack of access to housing.

Question 17

Equity is:

Answer 17

best described as the process of raising the bar enough to enable disadvantaged groups to access equality.

The process of equality results in everyone having the same access/rights. However (watching ball game from behind a fence), this still puts the shorter person as a significant disadvantage. The process of equity enables accommodations to be put in place which provides an additional remedy to the disadvantaged person, thus placing them in an equal position with their peers.

Question 18

Situations of inequitable treatment for people with a disability in Australia include:

Answer 18

The Disability Pension is the same for people with a very minor disability who could work part-time if they chose, as it is for a person with multiple, significant disabilities who are reliant upon 24 hour support.

In order for people with a disability to attend paid community events (such as musicals, sporting events, movies), they have to pay for the ticket for their support staff as well as their own.

A person with a disability who struggles to communicate independently, and therefore takes a long time to present information doesn’t receive a longer session at the Doctor, nor gains any specialized assistance to communicate, unless they supply it themselves.

There are various interpreting services and subsidies for people who are Deaf, or speak another language, yet if a person with a disability needs support or help using augmented communication, they are reliant upon only their support workers.

Making modifications to a vehicle to enable a person with a disability to operate it is excessively costly and can only be done to a small variety of vehicles.

Question 19

Human rights issues affecting people who are aged:

Answer 19

One of the key contributing factors to this occurring is the slow degeneration of decision-making capacity which often goes unnoticed by many until the person is in a situation where they have not been able to maintain their rights and are living in an unsafe situation, with little appropriate food, clothing or shelter, and/or have been the victim of elderly abuse, assault, neglect or exploitation.

Elder abuse is a significant issue in Queensland, in Australia and across the world.

Lack of access to food/drink/supplies due to mobility issues;
Difficulty accessing appropriate service provision;
Homelessness;
Workplace discrimination;
Inequitable decision-making arrangements;
Barriers in accessing government support, funding, pensions or services.

Question 20

Strengths-Based & Person-Centred Responses:

Answer 20

Strengths-based service provision goes hand-in-hand with person-centred service provision as it is based on the foundation of looking at situations, people and opportunities from an ‘abilities’ not ‘disabilities’ perspective.

An excellent example of this is how support staff speak about service users to new staff. So many support workers will believe it important to list every problematic thing the person has done to ‘warn’ the new staff member. However, if we applied this mentality to life in general and listed every problematic thing we have done when we met new people, then there’s every likelihood that people would not want to speak with us at all. Strengths-based service provision means we look from what the person can achieve, not from what they cannot.

Person-centred practice and individualized support are service provision mechanisms which require all decisions, planning and service provision to be based upon and centred on the individual.
Person-centred planning must not require the person to fit the service, but instead, the service must adapt, change or refer to enable the service to fit the person’s needs.

Question 21

Ethical Considerations:

Answer 21

Ethical battles present alternative perspectives that situations can be viewed from, which can challenge your beliefs about what should and shouldn’t be done.

Ethical battles can be about client care, family relationships, requests from individuals outside of care frameworks, competing demands of health professionals with the personal views and expectations of clients.

One of the reasons that ethics are so important to people working in the community sector is that there is often little ‘black and white lines’ regarding what is right and what is not right in various situations. Many workers will struggle to even identify an issue to be of an ethically dubious nature, let alone have the self-reflective skills to transparently self-reflect on their actions and critique their handling of certain situations.

Ethical considerations are broad and all support staff who work in the community sector need to possess an excellent level of mindfulness and self-reflection regarding ethics.

Question 22

Key strategies for maintaining a positive ethical perspective are:

Answer 22

To be able to identify your own, personal ethical vulnerabilities, based on your specific circumstances.

To be able to identify and action conflict of interest.

To have the skills to form plans regarding ethics and areas which pose ethical conflicts.

To know who to speak with, to get guidance and support with regard to ethically confusing situations.

To be aware of your position description, code of conduct and access opportunities for professional development and professional boundaries.

To have key people in your life who support you maintaining a healthy work/life balance and key strategies to cope with difficult situations and ethical conflicts when they arise.

To feel confident to provide and receive feedback about your professional responsibilities and ability to work within the parameters of your role consistently.

To be able apply feedback when received, for the purpose of enhancing your professionalism and ability to apply a strong, positive and consistent ethical presence within your role.

Question 23

Self-Reflection, Peer Support & Professional Mentoring:

Answer 23

One of the first steps to maintaining your ethics and ensuring the framework you work within is both appropriate and conducive with your work role is to have a process of continual self-reflection upon your conduct, your work, your professional boundaries and your ability to cope with work and maintain a healthy work/life balance.
Self-reflection requires you to think about how you’re travelling and take a third person’s view of your skills, abilities and (most importantly) vulnerabilities and weaknesses.

Suggestions:
keep a reflective journal;
work on critical incident analysis;
try mind-mapping;
use supervision effectively;
keep it positive;
use a model that works for you;
find a critical friend (a person who will listen and ask provocative questions to prompt deeper thinking. The critical friend might use a framework, or a set of reflective questions.)

Question 24

Implementing legislation and legislative stipulations within organisations requires relevant staff and members of the Governance or management know:

Answer 24

Which particular areas of their work are governed by certain legislative stipulations;
Which legislation regards which policies and procedures and what requirements exist around conforming to this legislation;
Changes in legislation as they affect the service and its operation;
The differences between Department directed funding stipulations and legislation and how to factor both into service provision;
Relevant organisations or specialists to seek more specific advice from, with regard to legislation and the way it affects service provision;
Examples regarding the way to interpret legislation and methods of including legislative stipulations within codes of conduct, human resource documentation and procedures, organisational forms and templates and position descriptions of staff.

Question 25

To Implement legislation and legislative stipulations within organisations, relevant staff and members of the Governance or management need to know:

Answer 25

Which particular areas of their work are governed by certain legislative stipulations;
Which legislation regards which policies and procedures and what requirements exist around conforming to this legislation;
Changes in legislation as they affect the service and its operation;
The differences between Department directed funding stipulations and legislation and how to factor both into service provision;
Relevant organisations or specialists to seek more specific advice from, with regard to legislation and the way it affects service provision;
Examples regarding the way to interpret legislation and methods of including legislative stipulations within codes of conduct, human resource documentation and procedures, organisational forms and templates and position descriptions of staff.

Question 26

One of the most common ways that many community service organisations maintain legislative compliance:

Answer 26

Through their networks and memberships with other organisations.
Many organisations will be subscribed to peak bodies who offer mail outs, emails and information sessions about funding stipulations, policies and procedures, legislation, common law principles and decisions, regulations and reviews of legislation.

Question 27

Regarding funding, most organisations must comply with:

Answer 27

funding stipulations which are set by a third party.

The most common third party is the Government and most Government Departments have stipulations which are enforced through mandatory audits or service funding agreements. Auditing and quality assurance process and/or standards will vary between sectors.

Some other funding agreements between service providers and various Departments require compulsory or mandatory reporting to occur.

An example of this is that all service providers funded by the Department of Communities, Child-Safety and Disability Services will have a requirement, pursuant to their service agreement, to report all ‘critical incidents’ to the Department. Although this is not considered ‘mandatory reporting’ as occurs within a child-safety framework, this is still compulsory as non-complaint service providers could risk losing their funding, pursuant to their service agreement, as a result.

Question 28

How can service providers demonstrate compliance to Service Standards?

Answer 28

Policies and Procedures;
Position Descriptions;
Forms + documents (feedback forms, intake forms etc);
Membership forms/Codes of Conduct etc;
Team meeting minutes/agendas;
Strategic/operational plans;
Spreadsheets/registers to indicate status of police checks.

Question 29

Seven steps to the audit process:

Answer 29

1) Recognise the need for an audit
This is usually stipulated within funding agreement, by legislation, or as a sector practice standard.

2) Contact auditing body.
The service provider contacts an auditing body and requests they complete an audit (these are organisations who are certified to conduct certain types of audits and have been trained accordingly and are recognised as competent).

3) Stipulate type of audit required.
There are full audits which require the service provider to demonstrate compliance across all service standards and maintenance audits where the service provider only has to demonstrate compliance across a selected few service standards.

4) Date and Location of audit
The auditing body will tell them when and where the audit will be and will send out all the information pertaining to the audit (including what information the service needs to send them prior to audit, what consents they require from service users, types of information auditors will need to see when they are there, the times and dates they will be there and a schedule of what they will need to do and who they will need to interview and speak with).

5) Conduct the audit at location.
The auditing body will visit the location of the service provider and follow the schedule to conduct the audit. During an audit, an auditor may request to:
Look at service provider documents and registers;
Speak to a selection of staff;
Speak to clients and/or their family members;
Observe file-keeping and document handling systems;
Speak with staff and ask questions regarding staff knowledge of policies and procedures;
Speak with members of the board of management;
Look at staff files;
Look through client files;
Read policies and procedures and request copies of organisational forms which demonstrate that policies and procedures are being followed;
Interview the manager and some other key staff regarding how the organisation is run.

6) Desktop audit
After the face-to-face audit, the auditors sometimes need to conduct a ‘desktop audit’ as well. This means they spend time (not usually on location), looking through all the policies and procedures of the organisation and mapping this to the relevant industry standards.

7) Feedback and review:
After the audit is completed, the auditor will send feedback to the service provider and indicate if they have identified any non-conformities, non-compliances or major non-compliances which require rectification. If they have identified any of these, there will be stipulations regarding how quickly these must be responded to and what further checks or audits need to occur to demonstrate that they have been rectified.

Question 30

HSQS:

Answer 30

The Human Services Quality Framework Service Standards (HSQS) apply to any service which is funded by the Department of Communities, Child-Safety and Disability Services. This includes general disability service providers, child service organisations and most community and family service providers. The HSQS includes six service standards which organisations must demonstrate compliance against.

Due to the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), it’s assumed that the current service standards will be replaced with the Commonwealth service standards once the NDIS has rolled out in all locations. As the service standards which an organisation must follow are determined by the funding they receive, then the transition to a Commonwealth funded arrangement is likely to result in a transition to Commonwealth Disability Service Standards.

Question 31

Aged Care Audits and Service Standards:

Answer 31

The aged care sector is predominantly run using Commonwealth funding, therefore the service standards are also Commonwealth.

Question 32

Policies are generally made up with the following key elements:

Answer 32

Aim / Objective:
This section usually includes information regarding the key things that the policy has been written to do. This is like the ‘purpose’ of the policy.

Scope / Accountability:
The scope or accountability of a policy usually regards ‘who’ the policy is designed to direct and what/which legislation, or service standards it was designed to conform to. Policies must always be conducive with the law and cannot contradict it. If a policy does contradict any legislation, then the legislation will win.

Policy statement:
The policy statement is often a clear statement regarding the overall summary of this policy and the reason it needed to be developed. Not all organisations use policy statements.

Date of enforcement:
The date of enforcement is the date that this policy is approved or consented to by the relevant governance body. For non-Government organisations, this will be a representative from the Board of Management, for Government organisations, the approving person is usually a Director or Manager with the delegated ability to approve such policies. There will usually be a date, name, role and signature

Date of review:
The date of review is the date that the policy is due to be reviewed by the organisation. Most organisations set a generic timeframe for review of all policies, such as 1 year, or 5 years (for some smaller organisations). The most common timeframe for review will generally be 1 year, but it’s up to the organisation to decide what is most appropriate, based on the circumstances

Procedure:
(within a policy) Outlines the steps that the organization must take to meet the objectives/aim and the policy statement. The procedure is the longest and most substantial part of a policy and may contain steps, flowcharts, diagrams or any other type of information to illustrate how to achieve the objectives

Question 33

Continuous Improvement Register:

Answer 33

A frequently used strategy to demonstrate ongoing commitment to compliance is having a continuous improvement register which lists any areas that the service has identified (either through audits, feedback, complaints, team meetings or any other method), along with the rectification plans to respond to the areas which were highlighted to benefit from improvement action.

Question 34

General methods of maintaining optimal quality assurance mechanisms within an organisation:

Answer 34

In most situations, these include:
effective record-keeping practices;
safeguards regarding criminal checks of staff;
reviewed and approved workplace forms and documents.

Question 35

Key mechanisms for Coordinators, Managers and those who are responsible to maintain and facilitate quality assurance in an organisation are:

Answer 35

Ensuring policies and procedures and current, reflective of industry best practice and conducive with legislation;
Maintaining registers regarding work health and safety, risk assessment, blue cards, yellow cards, driver’s license;
Ensuring workplace documentation, such as templates, organisational forms, charts, meeting minutes and agendas are maintained with document control safeguards;
Holding and participating in regular networking events with other service providers, with the purpose of increasing knowledge within the organisation and capacity to meet the diverse needs of the sector;
Supporting and enabling staff to access professional development opportunities to increase their capacity to facilitate service excellence;
Updating and re-development of organisational forms and documents to maintain currency and reflect best practice within the sector;
Following a system which involves internal service audits to highlight areas for continuous improvement, along with the development of a schedule which facilitates the ongoing continuous improvement of the service;
Maintaining memberships with peak bodies, advocacy organisations, employee and industrial relations agencies and any other organisation which can provide ongoing updates, information regarding legislative and Department changes, along with any other information which might prove beneficial to the organisation;
Organizing opportunities for clients, their families, informal support networks and other stakeholders to meet with service representatives for the purpose of reviewing systems and procedures in place to facilitate service provision and provide feedback.

Question 36

Identifying, Responding to and Managing Non-Compliance:

Answer 36

Some of the more common non-compliances that an organisation would need to rectify are:
Staff who have expired blue cards and/or drivers licenses;
Staff who require mandatory training, but training is out of date;
Lack of evidence that feedback and/or complaints were followed up;
Incorrect templates used for team meetings and agendas;
When staff are interviewed by auditors, they are not able to explain what to do in the instance of identifying risk or observing a hazard in their work environment;
Asset, finance, WHS or continuous improvement registers are not current and have not been correctly updated;
Minutes were not kept from team meetings;
No evidence of the policy-stipulated process regarding staff hiring, management and termination;
Insufficient evidence that workplace procedures and forms were used appropriately (e.g. Evidence that 3 service users have left during the year, yet no ‘service user exit forms’ completed and no evidence that the ‘service user exit policy’ was followed.

Question 37

Responding to non-compliance results of an audit:

Answer 37

Clarify the extent of the non-compliance;
Develop a plan to rectify the non-compliance;
Determine the level of collaboration required to rectify;
Ensure the plan is appropriate and approved by organisation’s governance/management;
Place plan, improvement actions and identified area requiring action, on the continuous improvement plan;
Implement the plan;
Review the effectiveness of the plan;
Seek feedback from others (ideally external) regarding effectiveness of rectification;
Conduct an internal audit to determine if the matter has been rectified.