Official Community Visitors

The Official Community Visitor (OCV) scheme is part of the NSW Ageing and Disability Commission, and no longer sits with the NSW Ombudsman.

OCVs are appointed by the Minister for Families Communities and Disability Services, under the Ageing and Disability Commissioner Act 2019, and the Children’s Guardian Act 2019. OCVs come from a wide cross-section of the community, including people who have direct experience and expertise in areas such as disability services and supports, mental health, child protection, out-of-home care, advocacy and health care.

What are Visitable Services?

Official Community Visitors visit supported accommodation services providing full-time care in NSW. The focus of the scheme is for:

• children and young people in residential out-of-home care
• people with disability in supported accommodation
• people in assisted boarding houses.

What is the role of Official Community Visitors?

Official Community Visitors may:

• inform the Minister, Ageing and Disability Commission and the NSW Ombudsman about matters affecting residents
• promote the rights of residents
• consider matters raised by residents, staff and other people who have a genuine concern for the residents
• provide information and support to residents to access advocacy services
• help to resolve complaints or matters of concern affecting residents as early and as quickly as possible by referring those matters to the service providers or other appropriate bodies, such as the NSW Ombudsman, the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission and the Office of the Children’s Guardian.

In carrying out their role, OCVs may:

• enter and inspect a visitable service at any reasonable time without providing notice of their visits
• talk privately with any resident or person employed at the service
• inspect any document held by the service that relates to the operation of the service
• provide the Minister, the Ageing and Disability Commissioner, the NSW Ombudsman and the Office of the Children’s Guardian with advice and reports on matters relating to the conduct of the service.

Interested in becoming an OCV?

OCVs visit people living in residential care across NSW. Occasionally we have vacancies and are happy to receive expressions of interest from people who are looking to be appointed to the OCV role.

We are looking to recruit OCVs in a number of key target areas. Eligible applicants will be contacted if they meet the criteria for the role, and an interview and associated recruitment tasks will be arranged. You can find out more about our current EOIs via the iwork for NSW website.

Find out more about the impact of OCVs in the lives of people with disability by reading these short stories:

• A new phone for Maggie (PDF, 54.3 KB)
• Thank you and bye (PDF, 51.0 KB)
• A new resident moving in (PDF, 50.4 KB)
• A quick fix with big impact (PDF, 53.2 KB)

You can also read these interviews to better understand a day in the life of an OCV:

• A week in the life of an OCV – Disability (PDF, 153.2 KB)
• A week in the life of an OCV – OOHC (PDF, 184.6 KB)
• Interview with an OCV – Mick Herbertson (PDF, 230.1 KB)
• Interview with an OCV – Carmel Hanlon (PDF, 151.9 KB)

Need more information?

Read more about the OCV scheme (PDF, 226.4 KB), how to respond to OCV visit reports (PDF, 137.0 KB) and the access of OCVs to documents in visitable services (PDF, 141.2 KB).

A comprehensive guide on the role of OCVs, and the operation of the OCV scheme (PDF, 1.4 MB) is also available, as well as a plain English version of the Official Community Visitor booklet. (PDF, 278.5 KB)

To speak to someone in the Official Community Visitor scheme please call (02) 9407 1831 or email OCV@adc.nsw.gov.au.