Leave granted.

The Hon. SANDRA KANCK: Following my question of 4 July this year regarding abscondings from Glenside Hospital and the minister's inadequate response, further questions arise. In answering my question, the minister explained that there were a variety of situations where the staff would report the absence of detained clients. According to the minister, nursing staff will report a client as having absconded if they have wandered off to the canteen without notifying a member of staff.

This is certainly not the understanding of nursing staff of reporting procedures. When a patient is noted as being missing, a thorough search of the campus is undertaken and then, only after this is completed, will the staff report the client as missing and report it to police, as they are required to do. Staff have better things to do with their time than to cause themselves to unnecessarily write reports and contact police.

The minister has admitted to 105 abscondings in the 1999-2000 financial year, but I would query whether he was provided with an accurate record by management. Staff dispute this figure as being substantially better than reality. At this time I would also note that it appears that the Grove Close Ward is to be reopened to provide more secure or closed mental health beds in South Australia. While this may help contend with the ongoing crisis in acute mental health services, the action contradicts one of the priorities stated in the Brennan report. According to page 18, services at the Glenside campus are to be rationalised, with acute services such as secure beds to be moved off campus and relocated to mainstream venues. This is to be done as a matter of urgency with a clearly specified time frame for completion. My questions are:

1. On what basis was the figure of 105 abscondees from Glenside in the 1999-2000 financial year derived? Why were some abscondings not included in the final figure?

2. What are the medium and long-term plans for acute metal health care beds in South Australia?

3. What is the time frame for these plans to be implemented.

The Hon. DIANA LAIDLAW: The Minister for Human Services has provided the following information:

1. The initial figure of 105 absconders was derived from a manual collation of figures from service managers, thought to represent the most accurate figure available at that time. A revised figure (190 persons) has been derived from a newly installed Glenside Campus database and checked against a manual search of case-notes and incident reports.

The department recognises there are differing definitions, collation methods and IT systems for collating data. The term "absconding" should only be used to describe detained patients who are absent without leave. However, the Department recognises the importance of counting all patients who are absent without the knowledge and consent of their treating team.

The Implementation Plan for Mental Health services has identified a series of strategies to improve all aspects of data collection and analysis.

2. Future planning for acute mental health bed provision is guided by the document "A New Millennium-A New Beginning, Mental Health Implementation Plan 2000-2005", released in June 2000. This was developed from the Mental Health Clinical Services Planning Study conducted by MA International.

In the medium term, the current Glenside based acute bed services will be enhanced with the capacity to open additional closed beds on a short term basis at times of peak demand.

In the long term, the provision of acute mental health beds will be in line with Strategy 7 of the Implementation Plan, mainstreaming acute mental health beds as core services of general hospitals.

3. Timeframes for the relocation of acute psychiatric beds to general hospitals will be determined following appropriate and comprehensive consultation. Such consultation will inform the planning for number, type and location of acute and intensive psychiatric care beds.

The overall timeframe for full implementation remains at five years as defined in the Implementation Plan.