Child Protection Department Review ordered after system delivery failure involving nearly 9000 notifications

ALMOST 9000 child protection notifications over five years did not reach the department responsible for looking after the state’s most vulnerable young people, prompting an urgent audit going back to 2013.

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WELFARE concerns about thousands of at-risk South Australian children may have been left unchecked in a bureaucratic bungle that has again embarrassed the embattled Child Protection Department.

Almost 9000 child protection notifications over five years did not reach the department responsible for looking after the state’s most vulnerable young people.

The discovery has prompted the department to launch an audit going back to 2013 after problems were uncovered with the electronic Child Abuse Report Line known as eCARL.

It comes during a tumultuous decade in SA child protection services, which has included a damning coronial inquest into the death of four-year-old Chloe Valentine and a royal commission sparked by the arrest of paedophile carer Shannon McCoole.

In the latest incident, 8762 potential notifications were left in draft and not forwarded to the department by “mandated notifiers” — which includes doctors, teachers, nurses, psychologists and social workers — since July 1, 2013.

None of these drafts had been submitted by the notifier for referral to the database and it is unclear whether they were intended for submission or not, prompting the audit.

It is understood the issue was discovered when a police officer asked why no one had called him about 14 of his notifications. Under child protection laws, mandated notifiers can face fines of up to $10,000 if they fail to notify the department that they suspect, on reasonable grounds, that a child has been, or is being, abused or neglected.

A phone line is set up for when mandated notifiers believe a child is in imminent or immediate danger of serious harm, injury or abuse.

Online reporting system eCARL is used to report less serious concerns but also enables the department to identify children at risk.

Child Protection Department chief executive Cathy Taylor told the Sunday Mail that, once discovered, an investigation was immediately started.

Child Protection Department chief executive Cathy Taylor told the Sunday Mail that, once discovered, an investigation was immediately started to probe why draft reports were not being submitted to the eCARL system and to ensure that no child was at risk as a result.

“Our investigation has ascertained that no child was at risk as a direct result of the reviewed draft reports that remained lodged in the user’s personal inboxes during the last 12 months,” Ms Taylor said.

The Sunday Mail understands the survey found that of the 1000 drafts started but not submitted this year, about 8 per cent met the threshold for a response by the department.

A small number, estimated to be no more than 2.5 per cent, has been referred to SA Police.

The discovery has prompted an urgent review of all draft reports currently held in user inboxes. “An improvement to the eCARL system has been implemented to automatically email notifiers who have incomplete draft notifications, reminding them that they have not completed the notification,” Ms Taylor said. “This is in addition to the online report users already received.” In 2016, a Child Protection Systems Royal Commission was sparked by the arrest of Families SA carer McCoole, who a year earlier had been sentenced to 35 years in jail for sexually abusing babies and young children in state care.

Among the 260 recommendations in the report were calls to transform how concerns about abuse are raised and then responded to, and the screening of people who work with vulnerable children.

At the time, royal commissioner Margaret Nyland noted that a “staggering” 61 per cent of Families SA notifications requiring follow-up in 2014-15 were instead closed without any action because there were more urgent priorities and not enough staff.