We are calling for national oversight of the State-run child protection agencies.
The well-being of children should be of concern to everyone. All states and territories manage their own child protection services without any coordinated oversight by a national body. We are calling for a system which offers transparency and evaluation of all services.
The variance in services offered and their efficacy is significant. Some jurisdictions do better than others but there is no way of evaluating their successes or failures. A universal standard within the child protection system has been piecemeal and without any authority. Our call for a National Child Protection Assessment Board will challenge all states and territories to improve upon their systems and will, therefore, ensure a more comprehensive and robust assessment of the services provided. It will also highlight values within the system which disadvantage the most vulnerable people in our community.
We envisage that the Board will provide a scoring system for each state and territory. It will highlight deficiencies as well as strengths and make those findings public.
We acknowledge that seeking to change a state-based system to one which has federal oversight will be a challenge. It is worth noting that in the United Kingdom the establishment of OFSTED has led to improvements within the national child protection system. The Child Protection Party believes that the welfare of children is dependent upon improving systems which serve children by offering a critique of those services.
A National Framework for child protection is insufficient because it lacks teeth and application. In our view the National Child Protection Assessment Board should provide the benchmark for service provision Australia wide.
In order to ensure that the child protection systems provide fair, transparent and equitable solutions that aim for the best possible outcomes for children, it is essential that a National Framework and a National Child Protection Assessment Board be established.
