Before 2015, complaints against the chaplains program were reported in Senate estimates, along with the breakdown of the faiths of the pastoral care workers. A spokesman from the Queensland education department said complaints were “addressed with priority at the local level”. A spokeswoman for the Tasmanian education department said its guidelines suggested parents and students raised complaints at the school level. In 2015 federal education department officials told Senate estimates that in the previous year, 2,312 of the program’s 2,336 chaplains were Christian. In a 2015 consultation report the commission reported that complaints had been raised about the chaplains program at almost all of its public meetings.

Source: The Guardian April 14, 2018 23:37 UTC