We all have lists of things we wish should never happen. Abbott Coalition’s attacks on living standards in Australia include: 1. The worst budget in living memory with no sense of fair play or regard to pre-election promises. It cruelly attacked the poor while granting bonuses to the wealthy – creating outrage in the community. And the government […]
Higher Education for Care Leavers
The UK is miles ahead of Australia when it comes to supporting Care Leavers to study at universities and other institutions for post-secondary schooling. What’s more, the UK is making a determined effort to increase the number of Care Leavers entering and staying in education after the age of 16. We all know the close correlation between a […]
Breaking the Barrier of Silence around Child Sexual Abuse
Professor Shurlee Swain’s third paper for the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is a fascinating survey of previous royal commissions and other official inquiries in Australia. “The History of Australian inquiries reviewing institutions providing care for children” (2014) identifies 83 Australian inquiries. Download the paper here. The first, a NSW Select Committee on Destitute […]
History of institutions providing out-of-home residential care for children
This is the 2nd of Prof Shurlee Swain’s three research papers for the Royal Commission It can be downloaded here This will prove to be the most fascinating of the Swain papers for those who are new to this area. It explains the many different types of institutions offering out-of-home ‘care’ for children in Australia from […]
Child Protection – A History of Australian Laws
The History of Child Protection Legislation in Australia Shurlee Swain’s first paper for the Royal Commission (I’m not sure the three papers are meant to be read in any set order) surveys the legislation relating to the out-of-home care of children. The paper can be downloaded here. Reminding us that child welfare in Australia was […]
Foster Care in Crisis
I wish we didn’t need so many kids to be placed in the care of foster families. But, with more than 40,000 Australian kids unable to be looked after by their parents because of poverty, family breakdown, drug and alcohol issues and violence – and lack of support in a crisis – things are in a very bad […]
10 Blunders in Child Welfare
UPDATE The ten worst blunders in child welfare in Australia since 1788. COUNT DOWN TO NUMBER 1 It has been hard deciding which of all the many mistakes of the past – and those which continue to be made – warrants the title “the worst”. But here it is. BLUNDER # 1: Having inflicted significant damage on children […]
Indefinite Detention of Asylum Seekers Not Lawful
After a long period of ambivalent rulings, the Australian High Court on Thursday (11 December 2014) finally defined the limits of mandatory detention of asylum seekers. In recent years, many of us in Australia have been disturbed by what seemed to be a routinised indefinite detention of thousands of refugees, including children. “Since September 2013, the average time spent in […]
The Papal Trucking Company Pty Unlimited
I highly recommend this opinion piece by Tony Webber in the Dubbo PhotoNews, 30/8/14. In a devastating critique of the church’s scandalous handling of child sex abuse, Tony drives Cardinal Pell’s truck to its illogical conclusions. A trucking company “would not try to gets itself categorised as an unstructured, non-commercial entity to avoid paying due compensation to its victims.” […]
A Rousing National Anthem
Sometimes we can take nationalism too seriously. There comes a time when it might be fun to poke the ribs of the doctrinaire. This is from Susan Butler’s new book, The Aitch Factor (Pan Macmillan, 2014)