Overview
Community services targeted to children and youth include children's services, such as child care and preschool, as well as child protection, adoption and Juvenile Justice. While Indigenous people account for 2.4% of the total Australian population, the younger age structure of the Indigenous population means that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children aged 0-14 represent 40% of the Indigenous population as a whole and 4.6% of all Australian children aged 0-14. This means that community services targeted to children have the potential to impact on a greater proportion of the Indigenous population than any other service type within the community services sector. Despite this, Indigenous children are under-represented in children's services and over-represented in child protection and juvenile justice services.
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Child protection
Overview
Most children and young people live in family environments that are nurturing and caring and assist them in their development. The child protection system provides for those children and young people whose parents, caregivers or guardians are unable or unwilling to protect them against significant harm. Child protection services are the responsibility of community services departments or their equivalent, in each state or territory. External agencies, such as community organisations, may be contracted by the departments to provide services that range from family support to the placement of children in out-of-home care. Each state and territory has its own legislation, policies and practices regarding child protection, and as a result the data collected are not comparable across all jurisdictions. This difficulty is illustrated by the different definitions used by states and territories. These differences might arise in regards to what constitutes substantiation of an investigation or what qualifies as a child protection notification. Significant variations in the states' and territories' child protection data may be partly attributable to the different definitions and practices used to record both substantiations and Indigenous status.
For further information see Child protection.
Definitions
Notification Child protection notifications consist of reports made to an authorised department by persons or other bodies making allegations of child abuse or neglect, child maltreatment or harm to a child. A single notification can involve only one child and a single event, multiple events relating to a single child within a financial year should be counted as separate notifications.
Investigation An investigation is the process whereby state and territory child protection and support services obtain more detailed information about a child who is the subject of a notification and makes an assessment about the harm or degree of harm to the child and the child's protective needs.
Substantiation A substantiation is a child protection notification which was investigated and finalised and for which it was concluded that there was reasonable cause to believe that the child had been, was being or was likely to be abused or neglected or otherwise harmed.
Care and Protection order A care and protection order covers any child for whom state/territory child protection and support services have a responsibility as a result of some formal legal order or an administrative/voluntary arrangement. The order can be from a Court, Children's Panel, Minister of the Crown, authorised child protection and support services department officer (e.g. director) or similar tribunal or officer, and may cover:
- total responsibility for the welfare of the child (e.g. guardianship)
- responsibility for overseeing the actions of the person or authority caring for the child
- responsibility for providing or arranging accommodation or reporting or giving consideration to the child's welfare.
Out-of-home care The placement of children in the child protection system with a carer outside their usual place of residence.
Child protection data
Nationally, child protection data are collected under three broad categories: notifications, investigations and substantiations; children on care and protection orders; and children in supported overnight out-of-home care.
Initially, children who are seen to be in need of protection come to the government's attention through a report by an individual or organisation, or the children themselves. These reports are assessed by the relevant department and those found to be valid are classified as 'child protection notifications'. These notifications are then re-examined to determine whether the notification should be 'investigated', dealt with by other means or whether no further action is required. Once an investigation is completed, the notification will be classified as either 'substantiated' or 'not substantiated', depending on the degree of risk or harm to the child. Departmental involvement may take the form of service provision to the child and his/her family, a referral to another agency, or direct intervention on the child's behalf.
The department may apply to the relevant court to place a child under a care and protection order at any point in the process, but this is usually an intervention of last resort. Care and protection orders vary between states and territories, but generally they provide for either a supervisory role or the transfer of legal guardianship to an authorised department. The issuing of a care and protection order is often a legal requirement if a child is to be placed in out-of-home care. This option can be used to protect a child from abuse or potential abuse, or when there is need to give the child 'time-out' from family conflict. It is also used in cases where the parents are ill, or for any other reason incapable of looking after the child.
The following paragraphs give an overview of available data on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the child protection system.
Substantiations
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are more likely to be the subject of a substantiated investigation than other children. In 2004-05 in all jurisdictions, except Tasmania, the substantiation rate for Indigenous children was higher than the rate for other children. The underlying causes of the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the child protection system may include:
- the legacy of past policies of the forced removal of Aboriginal children from their families
- intergenerational effects of previous separations from family and culture
- poor socio-economic status
- cultural differences in child-rearing practices.
The reasons for substantiation of an investigation also differed for Indigenous and non-Indigenous children in 2004-05. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children were more likely to be the subject of a substantiated investigation for neglect, whereas for non-Indigenous children the more likely reason for substantiation was abuse.
Trends in the proportion of Indigenous children who are the subject of substantiated investigations show that the rates have increased for all jurisdictions between 1998-99 and 2004-05, but that there is variation between the jurisdictions. These increases must be analysed in the context of data quality improvements, most notably in increased rates of Indigenous identification within the jurisdictional data collections.
More information on the quality of Indigenous data can be found in Quality and availability of Indigenous statistics.
Care and Protection Orders
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the child protection system were more likely to be on care and protection orders than other children. Most Indigenous children were on guardianship and custody orders or arrangements which were similar to the types of orders non-Indigenous children were on.
Out-of-Home care
At 30 June 2005, the national rate of Indigenous children in out-of-home care was over 6 times the rate for other children. Of all the children in out-of-home care in 2004-05 (23,695 children), 5678 (24%) identified as being of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander origin.
The rate of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children aged 0-17 years in out-of-home care at 30 June 2005 was 26.4 per 1,000 Indigenous population aged 0-17 years. The overall rate of children placed in out-of-home care was 4.9 per 1,000 Australian population aged 0-17 years. Out-of-home care placements for Indigenous children are made in accordance with the Aboriginal Child Placement Principle.
For more information see The Aboriginal Child Placement Principle on this page.
Adoption
The formal adoption of Indigenous Australian children is not common. In most instances when it is necessary for a child to be permanently moved from their family, informal arrangements are made for children to live with a relative or other member of their community. Arrangements of this type are generally preferred, and adoption orders are made only when informal alternatives are judged to be not in the best interests of the child.
The Aboriginal Child Placement Principle applies to adoptions; see The Aboriginal Child Placement Principle, below. When the placement options outlined by the Principle are not available, Indigenous children may be adopted by other families. Of the 65 local adoptions in Australia in 2004-05, four (6%) were of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. Of these, two children were adopted by Indigenous parents, the other two children by non-Indigenous parents.
For further information see Adoption.
The Aboriginal Child Placement Principle
The Aboriginal Child Placement Principle outlines a preference for the placement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children with other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people when they are placed outside their family (Lock 1997:50). The Principle has the following order of preference for the placement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children:
- with the child's extended family
- within the child's Indigenous community
- with other Indigenous people.
All jurisdictions have adopted the Aboriginal Child Placement Principle either in legislation or policy. The impact of the Principle is reflected in the relatively high proportions of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children who were placed either with Indigenous caregivers or with relatives in many jurisdictions.
Children's services
Overview
The target age group for child care is usually children aged between 0 and 12 years. ABS population estimates for 2004 projected that there were 182,032 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the 0-14 year age group, representing 37.6% of the total estimated Indigenous population in 2004. The comparable figure for the total population was 3,981,497 children aged 0-14, comprising 19.8% of all Australians.
The younger age structure of the Indigenous Australian population means that in 2004, Indigenous Australian children were projected to comprise 4.6% of all children in this 0-14 year age group. Only 1.8% of children using child care services funded under the Children's Services Program (CSP) were Indigenous children aged 0-12 years.
Formally funded child care programs
Many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families do not want or need formal child care, preferring to make use of informal arrangements with family and friends when the need arises (ABS 1995). For those who do seek child care, the available options for children under school-age include long-day care (in purpose-built centers), family day care (in private homes) and occasional care. Services available for children at school age include, before-school care, after-school care and vacation care. Most of these services are funded, at least in part, by the Commonwealth Government under the Child Care Program (CCP). Most Commonwealth-funded programs give highest priority to children whose parents are working, seeking work, or undertaking study or training.
There are two child care programs which were originally funded by the Commonwealth outside joint agreements with the states and territories. These are Multifunctional Services and Multifunctional Aboriginal Children's Services (MACS). Multifunctional Services are located in rural areas and provide services for children aged 0-12 years, while MACS are located in areas of special needs and are designed to provide culturally appropriate care for children in both rural and urban Aboriginal communities. Services to mothers, nutrition programs and playgroups may also be provided under MACS. Both programs are referred to as 'multifunctional' because they incorporate a number of different services, such as long-day care for pre-school age children and after-school care and vacation care for school-aged children.
In 2004 approximately 10% of children using multifunctional children's services were Indigenous and 88% of children using MACS were Indigenous.
For further information see Children's services.
Juvenile justice NMDS
The AIHW and all states and territories have successfully established a national data collection (the Juvenile Justice National Minimum Data Set, or JJ NMDS) that provides nationally comparable data on the experience of juveniles who come into contact with the juvenile justice system in Australia.
In 2006, the AIHW released the first publication of the JJ NMDS, entitled 'Juvenile Justice in Australia 2000-01 to 2003-04'. The data in this publication showed that during 2003-04, almost 34% of juveniles aged 10 to 17 years who had contact with the system at some time during that year were Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander youth. This amounts to a rate of 34.2 per 1,000, compared with 2.8 per 1,000 for non-Indigenous juveniles. The higher rate of contact with the juvenile justice system for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth is a consistent finding across all jurisdictions. In addition, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth who come into contact with the juvenile justice system tended to be younger than other juveniles. Of those juveniles aged 10 to 12 years who had some kind of contact with the juvenile justice system during 2003-04, around 55% identified as being of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander origin. This compared with around 27% of those aged 16 years and over.
Of the 12,992 juveniles who had contact with the juvenile justice system during 2003-04, nearly 9% had an unknown Indigenous status. The states and territories who contribute the data from the JJ NMDS are committed to improving their identification of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth through a range of system and data collection changes.
For further information see Juvenile justice.