The South Australia Professional Standards Office is located within the Catholic Diocesan Centre in Adelaide.

Initially the office was set up to coordinate the Towards Healing Programme, and to provide expert advice to bishops and leaders of Religious Institutes to help facilitate their role in respect to responding to complaints.

In South Australia, in addition to the coordination of the Towards Healing Programme, the office has further developed, and has a responsibility for the following programme areas:

Child Protection

• In relation to Child Protection, the office has the responsibility to contribute to the ongoing development of policy, identification of preventative measures, and the provision of services to assist in the development of a child-safe environment in all agencies within the Church

• The Professional Standards Office provides the Executive arm of the South Australian Catholic Child Protection Council

• As a child-safe initiative, the Police Check Unit has been established to coordinate all police-checking for employees and volunteers in the Archdiocese of Adelaide

• The Professional Standards Office Records Service has been established to provide former residents of South Australian Catholic Residential Facilities with access to records that may be held in the Archdiocese