Cunningham: Children the real victims of misguided ideology

Territory Families will always say its first concern is the safety and well-being of the child. But recent history is littered with cases where this concern has clearly taken a back seat to other, ideologically-driven priorities, writes Matt Cunningham.

Two children were taken from NT foster carers after the carers raised concerns.

Speaking at the NT News Future Forum just over a week ago, Chief Minister Eva Lawler said she had left behind the ideology that had at times driven the decisions of the Labor Government she now leads.

“I’m hoping you see a person who makes decisions that are based on listening to Territorians, the best decisions for the Territory, rather than on ideology or political alignment,” she said. And while ditching the ideology might be possible for a government making one final roll of the dice in the hope of holding on to power, ridding this same curse from governmental departments will prove a far more arduous task.

No issue has been more prone to the prevalence of this dogma than child protection.

For the past 20 years our child protection department – known by various names regularly changed to try to hide the errors of its past – has consistently made decisions driven by a misguided set of principles that have, in too many cases, ended with tragic results for the children it is supposed to protect.

This week it was revealed two Territory foster carers had an Aboriginal baby and toddler removed from their care after making a mandatory notification that they believed the older child may have been sexually abused.

To add insult to injury, the carers say the Department of Territory Families, Housing and Communities subsequently, and falsely, accused one of them of the same abuse they had tried to raise concerns about.

It’s the latest in the long list of horror stories that have left a trail of distraught victims.

In this case, the carers are justifiably horrified.

They have attempted to do a good community service, and instead been put through horrendous trauma.

A child they raised from birth was literally stripped from their arms.

But the other victims in this case are those children.

For six months they were given a loving, nurturing home.

Then, suddenly, they were taken from those people who had loved and cared for them, and were placed – we can only assume – in a new and unfamiliar environment.

What sort of damage has been done to their developing minds?

When it tries to defend its actions, Territory Families will always say that its first concern is the safety and well-being of the child.

But recent history is littered with cases where this concern has clearly taken a back seat to other, ideologically-driven priorities.

Who could forget the case of Deborah Melville, the 12-year-old Indigenous girl who in 2007 died a slow and painful death from blood poisoning in her thigh after being left for days in the dirt of a Palmerston backyard.

Deborah had been placed in the care of an aunt who had little capacity to care for her. Coroner Greg Cavanagh later questioned whether the department – known then as Family and Community Services (FACS) – was placing too much emphasis on the Aboriginal Child Placement Principal, which sees Indigenous children only placed with non-Indigenous carers as a matter of last resort.

He also blamed her death on the “chaotic and dysfunctional nature of the office environment and professional workings of FACS.”

Fast forward 17 years and the department’s name might have changed, but little seems to have improved.

In fact, contrary to Mr Cavanagh’s warnings, and following the 2017 Royal Commission in the Protection and Detention of Children, this government had been at pains to place more emphasis on the ACPP.

The horror stories, however, have continued.

None worse than the rape of a two-year-old girl in Tennant Creek in 2018.

A girl who, along with her siblings, had been the subject of 52 notifications to Territory Families before the incident occurred.

But none, it would seem, serious enough to ensure she was put in a safer place.

Was her safety the department’s primary concern?

In this most recent case, the greatest failing – and there are many – is not the treatment of the foster carers, as appalling as that has been.

It’s the outcome of the original, mandatory notification they made raising concerns that the toddler may have been sexually abused.

Three months after making the notification – and without a single subsequent inquiry from Territory Families about the matter – the department sent a one-line email saying there was nothing to see here.

“Allegations do not meet the threshold to investigate,” it said.

We can only wonder how low that threshold has been set, and who is most likely to suffer as a result.