(image via Inova Foundation)
Demand for protective child services is on the rise, with the latest data showing that the number of children receiving such services growing by around 10,000 per year.
In its latest report, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare said the number of children who received child protection services throughout Australia hit record high numbers in 2015/16 to come in at 162,000 – up from 152,000 in 2014/15 and 143,000 in 2013/14.
This means that one child in every 33 receives such services.
In addition, the proportion of those notifications received by child protective services which were ‘substantiated’ increased from 7.4 per thousand children in 2011/12 to 8.5 per thousand in 2015/16.
Substantiation occurs where an investigation concludes that there is sufficient reason to believe that a child is being, has been or is likely to be abused.
Protective services for children fall into three broad types: investigations, care and protective orders and out-of-home care.
Around Australia, child protection has been a focus of priority in recent years amid The National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children 2009-20 and the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
The framework has already seen the development of national standards for out-of-home care and is now emphasising prevention and intervention with a focus upon targeting assistance to communities who had most contact with the system.
In March 2016, meanwhile, the Royal Commission released a consultation paper highlighting opportunities for improvements with the out-of-home care system in order to help better protect vulnerable children from sexual abuse, including a nationally consistent approach to service delivery, better placement stability for children, better training for staff and carers and better understanding of perpetrator grooming behaviour.
According to the report, a majority (60 percent) of the children concerned were the subject of an investigation only whilst almost one quarter were both on an order and in out-of-home care.
Indigenous children were also seven times more likely to receive child protection services compared with non-indigenous children whilst children from very remote areas were four times as likely as those in major cities to be the subject of a substantiation.
AIHW spokesperson David Braddock said it was difficult to determine whether or not the increase in children using protective services was a result of more children being abused or greater levels of reporting due either to greater awareness arising out of the Royal Commission or mandatory reporting requirements being placed on certain professionals.
