Safety and security

Injuries

Injuries are a leading cause of death and hospitalisation among children but can be reduced by controlling hazards in a child’s environment.

Injury death rates among children aged 1–14 have halved between 1997 and 2010 (from 10 to 5 deaths per 100,000).

Childhood injuries can have profound and lifelong effects, including permanent physical disabilities or long-term cognitive or psychological damage. Children are particularly vulnerable to certain types of injury depending on their age, with older children increasingly influenced by behaviour in addition to their physical and social environment.

How many children die from injuries? 

During 2008–2010, the death rate from all injuries for children aged 0–14 was 5 per 100,000. Boys were 60% more likely to die from injury than girls, and the death rate was highest for infants (11 per 100,000). Injury death rates among children have been decreasing over time—by 50% between 1997 and 2010, from 10 to 5 deaths per 100,000 children. The injury death rate for Indigenous children was 3 times that for non-Indigenous children for the period 2006–2010 (data from New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and the Northern Territory only).

How many children die from road transport accidents, drowning and assault? 

Sixty-one children aged 0–14 died due to road transport accidents in 2011—a rate of 1.4 per 100,000 children. In 2008–2010, 136 children aged 0–14 accidentally drowned, with boys (63%) more likely to drown than girls.

The assault death rate for children in 2009–10 was 0.6 per 100,000, or 24 deaths. The rate of assault death was highest among infants at 2.1 per 100,000 infants, compared with 0.6 per 100,000 among children aged 1–4, and 0.4 per 100,000 for both 5–9 year olds and 10–14 year olds.

How many children are hospitalised for injury? 

There were 58,700 hospital separations for injury in 2010–11, representing 10% of all hospitalisations for children aged 0–14, or a rate of 1,381 per 100,000 children. Falls were the leading cause of hospitalised injury accounting for 45% of hospital separations, or a rate of 625 per 100,000.

There were 644 hospital separations due to assault—a rate of 15 per 100,000 children In 39% of these cases the perpetrator was a parent, carer or other family member.

In the same year, there were 553 hospital separations among children aged 10–14 for intentional self-harm, a rate of 39 per 100,000 children. In 4 of 5 cases the child was a girl.

Injury deaths among children aged 0–14, 2008–2010

 

Note: All causes of death from 2006 onwards are subject to a revision process. Affected data in this figure are 2008 (final), 2009 (revised), 2010 (preliminary).

Source: Based on ABS Deaths, Customised report, 2012.

Child abuse and neglect

While most children in Australia grow up in safe family environments, some are abused and/or neglected, which can cause significant, long-term harm. Adverse effects are diverse, and may include poor social and academic skills, a higher likelihood of criminal offending or mental health issues such as eating disorders, substance abuse and depression.

How many child protection notifications are substantiated? 

In 2010–11, 25,400 children aged 0–12 were the subject of one or more substantiated notifications of abuse or neglect, a rate of 6.9 per 1,000 children. The main types of abuse reported were emotional abuse (37%), followed by neglect (29%), physical abuse (22%) and sexual abuse (11%).

How many children are on care and protection orders? 

In 2011, 28,200 children aged 0–12 were on care and protection orders. The rates have almost doubled between 2000 and 2011, rising from 4 per 1,000 children to 8. This reflects the increasing number of families considered unable to adequately care for the children, which may reflect changing community standards regarding child safety. Some of the increase is likely to be due to children remaining on orders for longer periods of time.

Do the rates vary with Indigenous status? 

Indigenous children were 8 times as likely as non-Indigenous children to be the subject of substantiated abuse or neglect, and more than 10 times as likely to be on care and protection orders.

Children as victims of violence

Being a victim of violence can be detrimental to children’s health, sense of safety and security, and their feelings about the future. Physical and sexual assault can have complex short- and long-term negative effects on the physical and psychological health of children. Being victimised may lead to diminished educational attainment and social participation in early adulthood, and result in physical injury, suicidal ideation and behaviour, depression, disability and even death.

How many children are victims of physical assault? 

The ABS Recorded Crime statistics provides data on physical and sexual assault. Because of variability in interpretation of the National Crime Recording Standard, 2011 data on physical assault were included for only five states and territories: New South Wales, Western Australia, South Australia, the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory. Assault rates for children aged 0–14 varied from 303 per 100,000 in Western Australia to 616 per 100,000 in the Northern Territory. Across all five states boys were much more likely to be victims of assault than girls except in the Northern Territory, where the rate of girls’ and boys’ assaults were almost the same (615 per 100,000 versus 617 per 100,000 respectively).

How many children are victims of sexual assault? 

About 6,700 children (157 per 100,000) aged 0–14 were the reported victims of sexual assault in 2011. These children constituted 38% of all reported sexual assault victims in that year, and three-quarters of the victims were girls.

How does the rate vary across age groups? 

All states and territories reported that the physical assault rate was much higher for the 10–14 age group than for 0–9 year olds. Reported sexual assault rates were higher for children aged 10-14 than for children aged 0-9 (291 and 90 per 100,00 children respectively).

Victims of physical assault by age and state and territory, 2011

 

Source: ABS 2012. Recorded crime—victims, Australia, 2011. ABS cat. no. 4510.0.

Homelessness

Homelessness has detrimental effects on children’s health and wellbeing. Babies and toddlers may have delayed physical and mental development; older children can experience stress, anxiety and high rates of mental health problems and behavioural disorders. The causes of homelessness are complex and may include economic factors such as poverty, unemployment, increased housing costs or an unstable home environment caused by domestic violence.

How many children use homelessness services? 

While it is difficult to measure precisely the number of homeless people, about 80,800 children aged 0–14 (19 out of every 1,000) accompanied a parent or guardian to seek the help of a specialist homelessness agency in 2010–11. Another 3,600 children went alone. The majority of accompanying children aged 0–14 were with a female when they attended the specialist homelessness agency (81% of accompanying child support periods). In 14% of cases they accompanied a couple and in 5% they accompanied a male.

Do rates of homelessness vary across population groups? 

The rate of Indigenous children accompanying their parent or guardian to a homeless agency was 7 times that for non-Indigenous children under 14 (99 per 1,000 children compared with 14 per 1,000, respectively) in 2010–11. The majority of accompanying children to specialist homelessness agencies were Australian-born, with only 5% of accompanying children born overseas.

How many people were turned away? 

The demand for a bed is such that in 2010–11 specialist homelessness services were unable to find immediate accommodation for everyone. Seventy-four per cent of couples with children—or 24 people a day—and 64% of individuals with children—or 154 people a day—were turned away.

Accompanying children using specialist homelessness services by age, Australia, 2006–07 and 2010–11

 

Source: AIHW SAAP National Data Collection.

Children and crime

There is widespread evidence that rates of offending tend to peak in adolescence, but for many this behaviour is short-lived and the offences are relatively minor. For a small number of children this behaviour becomes more serious and persistent and may result in juvenile justice supervision. Research indicates that children in the juvenile justice system commonly come from more disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds, have low levels of education, and have suffered high rates of childhood abuse and neglect.

How many children are under juvenile justice supervision? 

According to the Juvenile Justice National Minimum Data Set, there were 1,010 children aged 10–14 under supervision on an average day in 2009–10, with boys more likely to be under supervision than girls (rates of 130 and 31 per 100,000 respectively). Four in 5 children under supervision were supervised in the community, and the rest were in detention.

Do rates of supervision vary across population groups? 

Indigenous children are markedly over-represented in juvenile justice supervision; in 2009–10, Indigenous children aged 10–14 were almost 24 times as likely as non-Indigenous children to be under supervision on an average day (996 compared with 42 per 100,000). While only 4% of children in this age group are Indigenous, 48% of those under supervision on an average day were Indigenous.

Children living in Remote areas were more than 8 times as likely and children from Very remote areas 12 times as likely as those from Major cities to be under supervision (398 and 560 per 100,000 compared with 47 per 100,000). Children from the most socioeconomically disadvantaged areas were 6 times as likely to be under supervision as those from the least disadvantaged areas (210 compared with 37 per 100,000).

Children aged 10–14 under juvenile justice supervision on an average day by age, 2009–10

 

Note: Rates are not published where there are fewer than 5 young people.

Source: AIHW Juvenile Justice National Minimum Data Set.