‘Systemic failure, ballooning costs’: Government to spend $20m on child safety inquiry
By Cloe Read
The Queensland government will spend $20 million to establish an inquiry largely focused on investigating the cost of children in residential care, as the child safety minister criticised the sector’s “skyrocketing” budget under the previous Labor government.
The inquiry, to be led from July 1 by former federal court judge Paul Anastassiou KC, will investigate failings within what the Crisafulli government describes as a broken child safety system.
Child Safety Minister Amanda Camm on Monday confirmed the Commission of Inquiry into Child Safety would cost $20 million to establish, and would cover the setup of the office, support resources and staffing.
Child Safety Minister Amanda Camm announced the inquiry on Sunday. Credit: Matt Dennien
Anastassiou’s remit will include a focus on reforming the residential care system, including investigating the current state of the market of residential care providers operating under both for-profit and not-for-profit models.
It will also analyse the former government’s procurement and contracting process for residential care providers in a bid to improve efficiency.
The inquiry will be the second in recent years. It follows the completion of the Carmody Child Protection Inquiry in 2013, and raises the question of effectiveness, and cost.
Camm conceded the $20 million pricetag was a “significant investment”, but said she believed Queenslanders would agree it was necessary to act.
“In 2014 and 2015 the residential care and out-of-home care system budget was at $200 million. This year it is at $1.12 billion,” she said.
“I have real concerns when companies are paying themselves $5 million dividends to shareholders on the back of a service being provided to vulnerable children,” she said, referencing an audit into one for-profit residential care provider who was revealed to have paid dividends to their three shareholders totalling $5.21 million last year.
Camm said she wanted Anastassiou to have the autonomy to investigate governance arrangements, policy, and legislation. She also said she wanted the inquiry to probe how things were previously implemented under former governments, and the accountability for that.
‘Systemic failure, ballooning costs and tragic outcomes have continued unabated.’
Noel Pearson
Noel Pearson, speaking on behalf of the Cape York Institute for Policy and Leadership, said the child protection system had spiralled out of control for more than a decade, causing catastrophic harm to First Nations children and families. He said almost half of the children in out-of-home care are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.
“The last serious attempt to confront Queensland’s escalating child protection crisis was the 2013 Carmody Inquiry under the Newman government,” he said.
“This inquiry revealed an unaffordable state-sanctioned machinery of destruction, both failing to keep children safe and severing children from their families at unprecedented rates.
“The Palaszczuk government comprehensively failed to deliver reform and instead compounded the problems that existed in 2013. The child safety crisis has yet to be halted, let alone reversed. Despite enormous annual investment, problems have only increased.
“It is astonishing and appalling that the Queensland government made a 10-year $400 million commitment to implement the 121 recommendations of the Carmody Inquiry, tens of thousands of public servant hours were devoted to the response and yet, an independent evaluation found little had changed.”
Debbie Kilroy from Sisters Inside urged for the inquiry to not be more of the same. She said the announcement confirmed what criminalised girls had spoken of for a decade: that the care system was “a pipeline of state violence, not a pathway to safety”.
The government on Monday said the inquiry would probe the connection between juvenile offenders and their time within the care system.
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