Children as young as 13 regularly leaving residential care homes at night, whistleblower says

Children as young as 13 living in residential care are regularly leaving their homes at night to commit crimes, they said.

Children as young as 13 living in residential care are regularly leaving their homes at night to commit crimes because of a “free-for-all” system that does not enforce rules or consequences, a whistleblower says.

The Advertiser has been told staff morale is at an “all time low”, and assaults, aggression and verbal abuse have become a standard part of the job.

A Department for Child Protection (DCP) youth worker in the suburban Adelaide area, who has been in the role for more than 10 years, said they felt compelled to speak out about the situation because managers in the department have failed to act on the concerns of frontline staff.

“Someone will get seriously injured or killed,” they said.

The worker said staff in residential care homes were limited in how they can enforce rules; for example, they are not allowed to lock the home at night to prevent children from leaving.

“When they want to leave at night, there’s nothing we can do,” the worker said.

The worker said children often left at night to meet up with others, and staff later discovered they had been involved in illegal activity. The children are reported missing, as per protocol.

The worker alleged that youth workers in South Australia have recently been hospitalised because they have been attacked at residential homes.

They said some of the issues stem from the therapeutic “sanctuary” model that has been rolled out in residential care homes in SA, which works “brilliantly” in some homes but allows other children unbridled freedom.

Other issues included staff shortages and the quality of training, they said.

According to the department’s most recent annual report, there were 649 children living in residential care in June this year – up from 408 in 2018.

The Public Service Association, which represents youth workers, said the issues were widespread and staff were under “enormous pressure”.

“We have serious concerns about cases of assault and abuse of our members, and have been working closely with them to raise and address work, health and safety issues,” general secretary Natasha Brown said.

In a statement, a DCP spokeswoman said staff were “well trained” to support children in residential care to “heal from their trauma in a therapeutic way”.

“DCP monitors the number of missing person reports which relate to children and young people in care,” she said.

“This tends to show that the number of missing person reports relates to a relatively small number of children and young people.”

However, the department would not reveal how many children living in residential care have been reported missing in the past year.

The spokeswoman said the sanctuary model provides a framework for staff to better understand a young person’s behaviour and help them feel more secure, but “it can take time to reap benefits of this therapeutic approach”.