Vertaview Group is made up of organisations committed to creating lasting, positive impact on the lives of people with disability and mental ill health, and the ageing community. All members of Vertaview Group will act in your best interests, ensuring you are informed, empowered, and able to maximise choice and control.  Some of the services offered within the Group overlap, and if you choose one of our services, you will not be required to choose related or additional services from any other member of Vertaview Group.

Open Minds is committed to the safety and wellbeing of all children and young people. Open Minds has a zero tolerance for violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation of children and young people.

To support this commitment, Open Minds is focused on providing an environment where all children and young people are safe, feel safe, and their voices are heard about decisions that impact their lives.

Open Minds also respects diversity in cultures and child rearing practices. Open Minds promotes the cultural safety of children and young people of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and other culturally and/or linguistically diverse backgrounds.

Open Minds values the input of, and communicates regularly with, families and carers of children and young people involved in upholding their safety and wellbeing.

Open Minds is focused on preventing the abuse of children and young people, through a proactive approach that includes:

• identifying risks to the safety and wellbeing of children and young people early and removing or reducing these risks,
• fostering a culture of openness that supports all persons to safely disclose risks of harm to children and young people,
• treating all allegations and safety concerns relating to children and young people, seriously,
• enacting our legal and moral obligations to contact authorities when we are worried about any child or young person’s safety,
• ensuring workers understand that they are required to act in accordance with Open Minds’ Code of Conduct, and associated procedures and processes
• championing children’s and young people’s rights and modelling best practice in ensuring their safety and wellbeing,
• robust human resources and recruitment practices that minimise the risk of new and existing Directors, workers and volunteers from abusing children and young people,
• incident management processes that assertively respond to safety concerns regarding children and young people in required timeframes, and
• routinely training and educating our Directors, workers and volunteers on the risks and responsibilities regarding abuse of children and young people.

We are committed to ensuring safe and accessible assets that contribute to the quality of life of our customers and workers. We are also committed to managing our assets’ sustainability over the long term.

View our Asset Management Policy here.

Our Code of Conduct provides the standard for how we work and interact. It reflects our commitment to the people we support, our communities and each other. We uphold people’s rights, act with honesty and accountability, treat others with respect, and uphold the law in all that we do.

View our Code of Conduct Policy here.

Vertaview Group recognises customer service as a core priority. We are committed to ensuring that our customers, and the people they choose to represent them, are satisfied with the services we provide.

View our Customer Service Policy here.

We are committed to creating an environment that reflects the diversity of all people we support and all our workers. We enable all people to thrive and achieve their goals and foster fairness and inclusivity. This policy provides guidance for the Vertaview Limited Board and all subsidiary Boards, and our workforce, to treat people as individuals and value their differences.

View our Diversity and Inclusion Policy here.

Strong governance across Vertaview Limited and its subsidiaries is essential to delivering each entity’s purpose today and into the future. We will ensure a contemporary and appropriate governance framework is in place across the organisation.

View our Governance Policy here.

We are committed to providing and maintaining a safe, healthy and inclusive workplace for all workers, customers, contractors, volunteers, visitors and others who may be affected by our work.

View our Health and Safety Policy here.

We are committed to ensuring all information related to our customers, workers, associates, and the organisation, is created, collected, stored, accessed, shared and disposed of responsibly and lawfully.

View our Information Management Policy here.

We are committed to valuing and respecting our workers and will create and maintain a positive culture which promotes integrity, fairness, inclusion, accountability, and consistent decision making across all Vertaview Group workplaces. Doing so will enable us to deliver high quality customer service.

View our People and Culture Policy here.

We have a zero-tolerance approach to violence, any form of abuse, including sexual abuse, neglect, exploitation or discrimination. We are committed to prevention, early intervention and prompt responses.

View our Preventing and Responding to Violence, Abuse, Neglect, Exploitation & Discrimination Policy here.

We are committed to proactive risk management by implementing strategies and systems that minimise potential harm, comply with legal and regulatory requirements and maximise safe outcomes. This commitment helps us proactively identify and manage risks to protect people, maintain service quality and achieve our objectives responsibility.

View our Risk Management Policy here.

Our stakeholders are groups or individuals who can influence or are impacted by our activities (either directly or indirectly) and include customers, communities, government, government agencies and our workers.

We will engage respectfully, openly, and authentically with our stakeholders. This is to ensure shared understanding, to identify, and address issues, and discover new opportunities to learn and collaborate. Our approach will allow us to continually improve the services we provide.

View our Stakeholder Engagement Policy here.

The Vertaview Group understands that careful financial management is essential across Vertaview Limited and its subsidiaries to ensure the organisation can deliver quality services now and into the future. We are committed to effectively managing financial risk so that Vertaview Limited and its subsidiaries remain financially sustainable over the long term.

View our Treasury and Financial Sustainability Policy here.

We encourage and enable all workers, suppliers, associates, and other eligible individuals to come forward if they have reasonable concerns that we are not acting lawfully, ethically, or in a socially responsible manner, in a protected environment free from reprisal, victimisation, or improper conduct.

View our Whistleblower Policy here.

Our services meet the requirements of relevant quality standards.

As a registered provider, Open Minds meets the high standards required by the National Disability Insurance Scheme Practice Standards and Quality Indicators.

We are committed to providing quality service experiences for the people that we support and their families. We encourage feedback and promote the importance of client voice throughout all levels of the organisation. We have feedback and complaints systems in place and embed advocacy and supported decision-making models across the organisation enhancing client voice. We ensure that our clients have access to the information, tools, resources and supports they need to advocate for their service experiences and preferences authentically and effectively.

Our Clinical Governance Framework ensures all our clients’ needs are met in a supportive collaborative environment where leadership drives practice excellence, minimises risk and enhances the quality of life of people with mental health and pyshcosocial disabilities and their families.

We support clinical and practice governance by reporting feedback and incidents, investigating these reports and monitoring emerging trends from incidents and complaints, conducting in depth client reviews and through performance reporting mechanisms to identify issues of concern and provide oversight of risks. These activities are supported by a Clinical Governance Committee that reports to the Board.

In addition, our centralised Incident Management Team conduct regular sampling of reported incidents to ensure we have safeguarded the people involved, responded appropriately, investigated and informed improvements to our practice.

We respect the human rights of all clients. In practice this means supporting clients’ choice and control over their lives. This is embedded across all parts of our organisation including all our policies procedures, and work practices which are reviewed for human rights implications.

With a zero tolerance to violence, any form of abuse, including sexual abuse, neglect, exploitation, or discrimination (VANED) we are committed to prevention, early intervention, and a prompt response to concerns identified. We work to deliver and continually improve the effectiveness of our services with a culture of safety and quality being the responsibility of all staff.

Everyone supported by us, has access to personalised, evidence-based supports. This support is guided by our Practice Excellence Framework to ensure we continuously improve our practice. This Framework is underpinned by a whole of group approach to person-centred practice and best practice, embodying a strong culture of human rights promotion and quality of care outcomes. We have a team of multidisciplinary Practice Specialists and Researchers who have a pivotal role in providing practice guidance, expertise, and leadership to our clients, their families and others involved in their support.

At Open Minds, we are committed to upholding the rights of every person who accesses our services. We recognise that all individuals have the right to be treated with dignity, respect, fairness, and without discrimination. Download our Rights and Responsibility brochure and My Healthcare Rights document here.

At Open Minds, we are dedicated to ensuring our clients are safe, receive the best quality support, and have their human rights respected.

View our Safeguarding brochure here.