"Yes the CEO [of Menslink] did provide a reference for my son as he has provided for many other young men at the request of the young men themselves, their families or legal counsel. The reference provided for my son was at the request of all three," she told the Assembly.

"On the advice of my son's legal counsel I approached the CEO on behalf of my son. It should be noted … that this approach was made after he started voluntary work with Menslink. As noted last week, any voluntary activity undertaken by my adult son is choice and his responsibility and has no bearing on my ministerial responsibilities."

Ms Burch has been under mounting pressure to explain why her son was volunteering in schools with Menslink last year, talking to groups of teenage boys, while on bail and awaiting sentencing for aggravated robbery. Her son, Lloyd Burch, did not have the required Working with Vulnerable People clearance and Menslink was fined $2500 for the breach of the law. The volunteer work helped Lloyd Burch escape a jail term at his sentencing in October.

To date, Ms Burch has refused to answer questions about what role she had in facilitating her son's work with Menslink, but facing Mr Hanson's call for an inquiry, to be debated by the Assembly on Wednesday, she made the statement yesterday.

Her son had first volunteered for Menslink at last year's Multicultural Festival.

"He had heard of the good work they do and wanted to see firsthand how they worked with young people. This experience led him to want to talk more with Menslink about his own challenges. My son met with their CEO and while I'm not party to those conversations, they resulted with my son linking in with Menslink and the Silence is Deadly program."

Ms Burch said she never asked or directed Menslink to take her son into schools.

He had gone into schools 10 times last year. The law requires people to have a Working with Vulnerable People clearance if they're in schools on more than seven days in a year (or three days in a month).

As a result of the affair, Ms Burch has asked the education directorate to review the way the law is being handled.

Question Time descended into bitterness and name calling after the statement, with Ms Burch accusing Mr Hanson of a "vicious nasty attack", begun through the Canberra Times and continued "with high abandon and absolute venom" by Mr Hanson.

"Jeremy Hanson is a disgrace," she said, accusing him of "grubby gutter tactics" and taking "the lowest cheapest nastiest political shot". The Liberals had dragged her son down and "given him a good old kick in the gutter", she said.

"I do find the narrative that has been created by the Canberra Times and the Liberals showing politics at an extremely low ebb," she said. "Mr Hanson has been on radio today and in the press describing my son in the most negative terms ... as a mother it breaks my heart. There is no mention of the fact that my son has gone to great lengths to improve his life."

As the Assembly rowed over the issue, Speaker Vicki Dunne repeatedly asked the politicians to come to order, forced Chief Minister Andrew Barr to withdraw the word "grub" and Ms Burch to withdraw the description of the Liberals as "hypocrites".

A tearful Ms Burch said her son had erred, committing a "serious and horrible" offence but he had turned his life around and that should be celebrated.

"I will stand by him, as a son, and as a young man that has shown against the odds to pick himself up and be the good man that he will be today and for years to come and damn them to say any different."

A number of questions were not answered.

To a question about which schools her son had visited, Ms Burch said she would seek advice. She did not say whether parents had been contacted, but insisted that at no time had students been placed at risk.

Mr Barr was asked when he became aware of the breach, but despite being asked numerous times, his only answer was that he became aware "at the same time as other members of the community". Asked when the rest of the community became aware, he said it was a question he could not answer, but for some that would have been reading about it in the Canberra Times; for others through statements from Menslink.

Asked when she had alerted Mr Barr to the breach, Ms Burch would only say it involved her son and was a personal matter.

Asked whether anyone else in trouble with the law had been given an opportunity to talk to schools in an effort to reduce a pending sentence, she said the question was outside her portfolio.

Mr Burch also pointed to a message that Menslink chairman Michael Battenally has posted on the group's website describing the breach as "an operational compliance matter".

Mr Battenally also stressed that students had not been placed at risk. "This volunteer was accompanied by a staff member of Menslink at all times, along with staff from the schools involved," he writes. "… As a community organisation, with 12 years of success working with young people, we are very disappointed this situation has occurred."

Later, Mr Barr, continuing to describe the breach as an administrative oversight, said Ms Burch's response had been open and comprehensive.