Stakeholders from across the family support and child protection sectors recently came together to share their ideas and priorities for a new national agenda. A number of common themes arose, including the need to address underlying trauma, promote local decision-making and invest in more joined-up services to support families.
On 28 August 2019, Families Australia hosted a workshop in Adelaide on the future of national child and family wellbeing policy. With the National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children 2009-2020 due to conclude in 2020, this was a valuable opportunity for the sector to influence a new national framework.
Government and non-government participants from across the family support and child protection spectrum came together to share their ideas and priorities for a national agenda. The workshop was facilitated by Dr Brian Babington, CEO of Families Australia and convener of the National Coalition on Child Safety and Wellbeing.
Brian gave a brief overview of the previous national framework, highlighting successes such as the National Standards for Out-of-Home Care, appointment of a National Children’s Commissioner and better information sharing across agencies. The Child Protection National Minimum Data Set was noted as a particularly good example of collaboration towards a common goal, with all jurisdictions now producing additional data that feeds into the annual Child Protection Australia reports.
However, Brian also pointed to the increasing number of children needing a child protection response as an indicator that we need to revise our national strategy moving forward. This was the starting point for the workshop, which uncovered a number of common themes to inform the ongoing national discussion.
Many participants raised the need for a stronger focus on addressing underlying trauma, which is a significant reason for families coming into contact with the child protection system. This included a desire to move away from siloed services that respond to the symptoms of trauma rather than the cause, which risks creating further trauma. Participants also referred to the complexity of issues facing vulnerable families as a reason for more joined-up services that can effectively address poverty, domestic and family violence, mental health issues and drug and alcohol abuse.
The overrepresentation of Aboriginal children and families was a major theme of the workshop conversations, with attendees discussing the importance of addressing intergenerational trauma facing Aboriginal communities. Participants more broadly discussed the need to focus our family support efforts on vulnerable cohorts through actions to support at-risk families.
There was general agreement that we should focus on a few main priorities at a national level, allowing us to create change in key areas. Attendees acknowledged that spreading our efforts thinly can prevent us from gaining real traction, and that a more focused approach has a better chance of success. The need for more local decision-making was also mentioned, bringing decisions closer to the family and removing complex service hierarchies that can be a barrier to families receiving the help they need.
All of these conversations were underpinned by a consensus that there needs to be cross-sector collaboration that is broader than child protection alone. This requires us to reframe our efforts within a child wellbeing system that spans health, education, justice and social services.