Political breakdown: Kid Wellbeing - Research Paper Example

Policy Analysis Paper Keeping Them Safe Policy Context In order to reform its child protection systems and services, South Australia Government has initiated a program known as Keeping Them Safe. This program has been dubbed as government's vision on children's present and the future since it makes the case for change while charting a path that looks forward (Anderson, 2005). Keeping Them Safe is not only government's initiative but also of all other parties involved, which includes communities, parents and families. All of them have an obligation towards children, their wellbeing and their future. All of them have this responsibility of keeping Australian children safe - from abuse, from harm and from ill-health. Reports of child neglect and abuse have gone up many times in the last decade and while Keeping Them Safe has contributed a lot to addressing this issue, a lot more needs to be done yet (Higgins, et al, 2009). Keeping them Safe started from Robyn Layton DC, who was commissioned to study what Australian Government can do in order to provide better care and safe environment to children. Layton made recommendations, which are being implemented in Keeping Them Safe initiative. Keeping them Safe initiative was developed after the government consulted and patiently to everyone involved in the act - young people, children, parents, practitioners and workers in the field, people in the non-government sector and everyone who advocates for children's rights and their right to be safe. Policy Instruments: Methods and Levers The Australian Government understands that protection and care of young people and children is a shared responsibility (Bromfield and Holzer, 2008). Even as it begins with parents, the government realises that its support to them is of paramount importance to making this initiative a collective responsibility. Keeping this in view, the initiative provides a shared approach to wellbeing of children through a framework that is collectively meant for communities, parents, non-government agencies and the government. They are all supposed to work together to give Australian children better and safe environment to thrive. The framework included adoption of several key principles that could form the basis for shared outcomes. These included using New South Wales state plan framework's key indicators and also that of National Framework for Protecting Australia's Children 2009-2020; using baseline data based on indicators that pre-date KTS implementation; employing indicators that are important in terms of pre-conditions for change; using indicators that closely relate to Keep Them Safe demographic target groups; and use measures that are culturally appropriate (Australian Institute of Family Studies , 2010). The initiative is backed by a number of Australian legislation which include Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998, Crimes Act 1900, Privacy And Personal Information Protection Act 1998, Children and Young Persons (Care and Protection) Act 1998, Health Records And Information Privacy Act 2002; Education Act 1990, Ombudsman Act 1974, and Commission for Children and Young People Act 1998 (Holzer and Lamont, 2013). Retired Supreme Court Judge, the Hon James Wood AO QC. who presented Report of the Special Commission of Inquiry outlined eight principles that could pave way for childhood protection in Australia. These were: i) Community and the government; both have to share the responsibility of protecting collectively, ii) communities and families should understand that they are vested with primary responsibility of supporting and rearing children; at this stage the government must provide support wherever desired either through funded non-government sector or directly, iii) the whole system should be child-specific in context of their wellbeing, welfare and safety treated at par with each other and considered of paramount importance, iv) the government representatives can expect better outcomes only when they build a rapport with the families and their children, since the former recognise their strengths, needs and concerns and the latter 'open up' when befriended, v) child protection practice should be permanently guided by child wellbeing, attachment, and safety, vi) equal support services must also be directed at and available to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young persons and children, vii) they should be given a chance to be part of the decision-making process and they should be heard about their concerns for their children and how they can be cared for or protected. Their local communities should be empowered, and viii) all assessments should be evaluated, monitored and evidence-based. In order to measure outcomes Australian Early Development Index becomes an important instrument that is able to measure children's outcomes at the time of school entry. This index is a valuable instrument that provides an insight into how children are being looked after in the community and what is the success of government's strategies for improving the support and care. (SPRC, 2010). Policy Consultation and Coordination Processes For example two consultations were held in 2009 with Aboriginal stakeholders. These consultations were the foundation of a process that helped consultants inform Keeping Them Safe. Not only this, they were also consulted when Aboriginal Impact Statement was developed. The process was keen to establish cultural sensitivity and awareness link with the initiative (Keepthemsafe.nsw.gov.au, nd). Consultation outcomes Layton Review (2003a) mentions of wide consultations that took place for the Keeping Them Safe policy process. The consultation process included reaching out to many non-government organisations, several departments and their teams, carers, children, professionals and Indigenous people. A cross-section of opinions, nationally and internationally, were sought. Almost all important elements were incorporated, which included processes of influence, inclusion and deliberation (Althaus, Bridgman & Davis 2009:103). However, a relative silence was felt with regard to the consultative process and timing of the policy too indicated otherwise. The cause for this could be attributed to the lukewarm interest of Australian politics to community consultation and engagement (Althaus, Bridgman & Davis 2OO7:97; Manwaring 2010). Althaus, Bridgman & Davis (2007:103). remark that consultation processes' lack of successful outcomes was one of its major concerns. As part of the consultation process, several data sources were used to develop the framework. The most important of the same was Special Commission of Inquiry into Child Protection Services in NSW report and the Keep Them safe action plan (Wood, 2008a, 2008b, 2008c, 2008d; DPC, 2009). Besides this numerous individual consultations with the non-government and government organisations took place, apart from those with advisory groups, peak bodies and key organisations. Most of the consultations took place in 2010, particularly in the months of February and March. Policy Implementation: Strategies and Choices Policy implementation is based on government's action plan, which has outlined a set of goals to be achieved under the initiative of Keeping them safe: A shared approach to child wellbeing. These goals are: A healthy and safe start of life should be provided to children They develop properly and must be physically and mentally ready for school At school they young people and children meet the required educational and developmental milestones (Edwards, 2005) They should live in families where their physical, emotional and mental needs are adequately met They should be safe from injury and harm They and their families must have access to appropriate and responsive services if required The plan has envisioned providing early support to children and their families by improving services, help familial strength, and provide a system that is child-friendly and child-protective. All this will be founded on strong, early intervention, universal and community-based services. The implementation is based on seven elements (COAG, 2009) a) The universal service system Under this system these services will be provided to one and all, bringing under its purview such elements as health care programs for mothers, relevant support for parents and early childhood education. Early intervention on these aspects helps problems from arising in the first place. If the problems do arise, they can be indentified through universal services and subsequently appropriate support provided on the same. Each problem can be linked to an appropriate service that can handle it well (NSW Government, 2013). b) Strengthening early intervention and community-based services This means helping children to be brought up such that the need for entering them in the protection system is avoided in the first place. Keeping them Safe initiative works with families as part of its early intervention methodology so that matters of urgency can better be avoided. If the system is left free from responsibility at one point, it can very well be used at another (NSW Government, 2013). c) Improving the statutory child protection This point envisions improving the statutory child protection system in such a manner that it is focused and used with efficiency as an interventional measure only on children where it is required. As part of this covering the risk, efforts will be made to provide best possible support and care at-home to children who cannot live without their families. Court processes, if involved, will have to be made fairer and more user-friendly for families and children so that the measures to protect them are not hindered by court proceedings (NSW Government, 2013). d) Changing practice and systems Referral systems that are effective will be needed to connect right services with families and their children. Primarily, these include early intervention, and protection services that are statutory. Both non-government agencies and government will be responsible for coordination of these services and agencies will have to be transparent and forthcoming in sharing information. At the centre of these reforms for intake and then referral of child protection issues is a new model. This involves the constitution of Child Wellbeing Units, in the six government agencies, namely NSW Police Force, NSW Health (Area Health Services, the Children’s Hospital at Westmead), Ageing Disability and Home Care and Juvenile Justice, and the Departments of Education and Training, Housing (NSW Government, 2013). e) Supporting Aboriginal children and families Aboriginal children and their families are on the top priority of Keeping Them Safe, which will work with them and their communities as much as it would with non-Indigenous people. The idea is to address over-representation of Aboriginal children in the child protection system and the government is committed to this goal since specific concerns have been raised regarding Aboriginal children and their families in the Layton report. This also puts into focus not only the overall wellbeing of these children but also their representation in the juvenile justice system (Zubrick, et al, 2005). Subsequently the observations from implementation of the plan will be used to create Aboriginal Impact Statement which will highlight outcomes in specific context of Aboriginal system (Countryhealthsa.sa.gov.au, 2007). f) Strengthening community services sector partnerships Keeping them safe would not be complete without fostering partnerships from the community service sector. These include non-government organisations which will help the initiative lead a change throughout the social fabric of the country across all communities. This way government will be 'building capacity', as recommended in the Special Commission report, a factor considered as being critical to the success of this program and even for a culture change, which is considered to be an important factor at the bottom of this issue deserving as much attention. Different non-government organisations have been identified and divided into various categories, at least two - one that have the capacity to provide services on their own and another that will need assistance to accomplish the same. Cultural change, as mentioned above, would better be encouraged between the non-government organisations and the government. This, according to the government, will build trust between the two and greater flexibility in information-exchange. This will also help in workforce development which will be able to identify vulnerable groups like Aboriginal children or young people with disability. (Rees, 2009). g) Plan delivery and success measurement The plan will be consistently monitored by the government to make sure that promised deliverables reach the deserving ends so that outcomes as desired in case of children and their families alike are realised. For this a number of indicators will be developed to measure success of these reforms as implemented through different stages on the basis of evidence-based practices and contemporary research (NSW Government, 2013).. Policy Evaluation and Review: Internal and External The Keeping Them Safe framework is designed such that it has room for consistent reporting on the action plan and its key components. This reporting will assess how far and how effective have the goals been met. Even though the Keeping Them Safe does not provide any methodologies for evaluations that will be made locally, there is a provision for independent evaluations (Rees, 2009).. This is a deliberate move since the length and breadth of Keeping Them Safe initiative is very complex. It has also been felt that any other modality must not be let overshadow the actual aim of the program which is to improve safety and wellbeing of children through the child welfare system. The initiative anticipates improvements in delivery and service integration right up to the tertiary service systems from primary and secondary ones so that services received by children and their families are target-specific and efficient whenever they need them. Many components are included in the evaluation framework and these include: a) Keeping them safe meta-evaluation Under this component various evaluation components (Stufflebeam and Shinkfield, 2007) will be synthesised with meta-evaluation in combination with local evaluations, which will be initiative-specific. When data from different meta-evaluation studies will be available, the same will go into the making of a comprehensive account through a process that would attempt to integrate outcomes between several Keeping Them Safe actions. In order to make sure that local evaluations are congruent with overall Keeping Them Safe evaluations, systematic questionnaires and data collection guidelines have been formulated (Rural and Regional Health and Aged Care Services Division, 2008). This includes having good survey questions, using appropriate delivery mechanism like hardcopy and/ or online, ensure audience from whom data is being collected is clear about the purpose and ensure confidentiality. One challenge that is forecast will be to ensure consistency between local evaluations and overall evaluations. This is because it will be only individual evaluators to whom local evaluations will be accountable. To plug this loose end, the work of evaluations has been assigned to Department of Premier and Cabinet, which is an umbrella unit of individual agency representatives and governed by a committee (NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet Website, 2013). In this way Department of Premier and Cabinet officials will act like a small team and at the same time form a consortium sort of to govern the evaluations. This team will also be looking into research design to be used for these evaluations while developing appropriate methodologies. Wherever that can't happen, the same team will be responsible for supporting local evaluations and also monitoring them. b) Outcomes evaluation Some primary components of outcomes evaluation have been set up and these include: I. an indicators service system framework and family and child indicators II. at-risk families' cross-sectional study III. out-of-home-care cross-sectional children's study (KTS 2OO4). Policy Recommendations: Internal and External Funds to the tune of $5.2 million have been earmarked by the NSW Government to be spent over a period of four years for the rollout of the program. In order to have far-reaching access to parents in NSW total number of practitioners to be trained was designated at 1200, some of whom have already received training and additional 1000 were supposed to be trained by the end of 2010. June 2011 was fixed as the deadline for the program to be available to all children and parents. The target age group for children was fixed at 3-8 years (KTS 2OO5).. In order to optimise outcomes on the initiative, recommendations have been made to conduct themed studies so that data delivered are best interpreted and utilised. In this regard five studies have been suggested so that the initiative addressed key areas of concern. These cover the following heads: Aboriginal families, young people and older children, near-the-threshold" families, non-government organisation service sector, and outcomes pertaining to statutory, tertiary and secondary services (KTS 2OO5).. References Anderson, A. (2005). An Introduction to Theory of Change. The Evaluation Exchange CI. Massachusetts: Harvard Family Research Project. Australian Institute of Family Studies. (2010). Keep Them Safe: Evaluation Framework Final Report, Volume 2: Annexes. Available http://www.dpc.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0018/125145/Volume_2_Annexes_3.8.pdf. Accessed November 03, 2013. Althaus, C, Bridgman, P & Davis, G 2OO7, The Australian policy hondbook,4th edn, Allen & Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW. COAG, 2009, Protecting Children is Everyone’s Business: National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children 2009-2020, Australian Government, Canberra. Countryhealthsa.sa.gov.au. (2007). Preparing an Aboriginal Health Impact Statement. Available http://www.countryhealthsa.sa.gov.au/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=Ebb7fMrpNK0%3D&tabid=675. Accessed November 02, 2013. Department of Premier and Cabinet. (2013). Directions Statement 2012-2015. Available http://www.dpc.nsw.gov.au/. Accessed November 02, 2013. Bromfield, L., & Holzer, P. (2008). A national approach for child protection: Project report. Australian Institute of Family Studies. Canberra: NCPC. Department of Premier and Cabinet (DPC). (2009). Keep them safe: A shared approach to child wellbeing, 2009–2014. Sydney: NSW DPC. Edwards, B. (2005). Does it take a village? An investigation of neighbourhood effects on Australian children’s development. Family Matters, 72, 36–43. Higgins, D., Bromfield, L., Richardson, N., Holzer, P. and Berlyn, C. (2009), Mandatory reporting of child abuse. Resource Sheet No. 3. Melbourne: Australian Institute of Family Studies. Holzer, P and Lamont, A. (2013). Australian child protection legislation. Available http://www.aifs.gov.au/nch/pubs/sheets/rs14/rs14.html. Accessed November 02, 2013. Manwaring, R 2010 'Unequal voices: 'strategic' consultation in 56uth Australia, The Journal of public administration, vol.69, no.2, pp. 178-189. NSW Government, (nd). Frequently Asked Questions, Available http://www.keepthemsafe.nsw.gov.au/resources/frequently_asked_questions. Accessed October 26, 2013. Rees, N. (2009). Keep Them Safe: A shared approach to child wellbeing. Available http://www.community.nsw.gov.au/docswr/_assets/main/lib100040/keep_them_safe.pdf. Accessed November 02, 2013. Stufflebeam, D. L. & Shinkfield, A. J. (2007). Evaluation theory, models, and applications. Wiley: San Francisco. South Australian Policy Online (SAPO) 2OL2, South Australian Policy Online: The Children's Protection (Keeping Them Safe) Amendment Bitt 2OO5 - draft for consultation, Available http://www.sapo.org.aulpub/pub2381.html, Accessed November 02, 2013. SPRC. (2010). KTSL Evaluagtion Framework. Report for The NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet. Australian Institute of Family Studies, Social Policy Research Centre, University of New South Wales. Rural and Regional Health and Aged Care Services Division. (2008). A guide to using data for health care quality improvement. Available http://www.health.vic.gov.au/qualitycouncil/downloads/vqc_guide_to_using_data.pdf. Accessed November 02, 2013. Wood, J. (2008a), Executive summary and recommendations: Special commission of inquiry into child protection services in NSW. Sydney: NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet. Wood, J. (2008b), Volume 1: Special commission of inquiry into child protection services in NSW. Sydney: NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet. Wood, J. (2008c), Volume 2: Special commission of inquiry into child protection services in NSW. Sydney: NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet. Wood, J. (2008d), Volume 3: Special commission of inquiry into child protection services in NSW. Sydney: NSW Department of Premier and Cabinet. Zubrick, S. R., Silburn, S. R., Lawrence, D. M., Mitrou, F. G., Dalby, R. B., Blair, E. M., et al. (2005). The Western Australian Aboriginal child health survey: The social and emotional wellbeing of Aboriginal children and young people. Perth: Curtin University of Technology & Telethon Institute for Child Health Research. Read More

Retired Supreme Court Judge, the Hon James Wood AO QC. who presented Report of the Special Commission of Inquiry outlined eight principles that could pave way for childhood protection in Australia. These were: i) Community and the government; both have to share the responsibility of protecting collectively, ii) communities and families should understand that they are vested with primary responsibility of supporting and rearing children; at this stage the government must provide support wherever desired either through funded non-government sector or directly, iii) the whole system should be child-specific in context of their wellbeing, welfare and safety treated at par with each other and considered of paramount importance, iv) the government representatives can expect better outcomes only when they build a rapport with the families and their children, since the former recognise their strengths, needs and concerns and the latter 'open up' when befriended, v) child protection practice should be permanently guided by child wellbeing, attachment, and safety, vi) equal support services must also be directed at and available to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young persons and children, vii) they should be given a chance to be part of the decision-making process and they should be heard about their concerns for their children and how they can be cared for or protected.

Their local communities should be empowered, and viii) all assessments should be evaluated, monitored and evidence-based. In order to measure outcomes Australian Early Development Index becomes an important instrument that is able to measure children's outcomes at the time of school entry. This index is a valuable instrument that provides an insight into how children are being looked after in the community and what is the success of government's strategies for improving the support and care. (SPRC, 2010).

Policy Consultation and Coordination Processes For example two consultations were held in 2009 with Aboriginal stakeholders. These consultations were the foundation of a process that helped consultants inform Keeping Them Safe. Not only this, they were also consulted when Aboriginal Impact Statement was developed. The process was keen to establish cultural sensitivity and awareness link with the initiative (Keepthemsafe.nsw.gov.au, nd). Consultation outcomes Layton Review (2003a) mentions of wide consultations that took place for the Keeping Them Safe policy process.

The consultation process included reaching out to many non-government organisations, several departments and their teams, carers, children, professionals and Indigenous people. A cross-section of opinions, nationally and internationally, were sought. Almost all important elements were incorporated, which included processes of influence, inclusion and deliberation (Althaus, Bridgman & Davis 2009:103). However, a relative silence was felt with regard to the consultative process and timing of the policy too indicated otherwise.

The cause for this could be attributed to the lukewarm interest of Australian politics to community consultation and engagement (Althaus, Bridgman & Davis 2OO7:97; Manwaring 2010). Althaus, Bridgman & Davis (2007:103). remark that consultation processes' lack of successful outcomes was one of its major concerns. As part of the consultation process, several data sources were used to develop the framework. The most important of the same was Special Commission of Inquiry into Child Protection Services in NSW report and the Keep Them safe action plan (Wood, 2008a, 2008b, 2008c, 2008d; DPC, 2009).

Besides this numerous individual consultations with the non-government and government organisations took place, apart from those with advisory groups, peak bodies and key organisations. Most of the consultations took place in 2010, particularly in the months of February and March. Policy Implementation: Strategies and Choices Policy implementation is based on government's action plan, which has outlined a set of goals to be achieved under the initiative of Keeping them safe: A shared approach to child wellbeing.

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