Culture of optimism hides child neglect
Ewin Hannan; 26/6/08
An entrenched and misplaced “culture of optimism” among child welfare agencies has exacerbated the failure of state governments to tackle child neglect, with thousands of non-indigenous children living in squalor throughout suburban Australia. Child welfare experts said revelations about the living conditions at two Adelaide houses highlighted the urgent need for a national reporting system and how state authorities prematurely closed neglect cases in the mistaken belief that chronic offenders could be reformed. As the Rudd Government works on a new national child protection framework, child experts renewed calls for a national database that used agencies such as Centrelink to track the movement of at-risk children from state to state.
See: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23923779-2702,00.html
Tags: Australia, Children, Human Rights