Act now or prepare for consequences

FOR a long time now, this newspaper has been reporting a story that some people don't want to hear. It's about foster carers.

It's a difficult story to write, because no doubt when most people think of foster carers, they have in mind community-minded citizens whose own children have left the nest, and who now have room in their home, and their heart, for a troubled child.

It's a lovely image and it's one state governments want people to have. It's also a con.

There are some good foster carers and, like it or not, there are some horrible ones.

For some time now, we've been visiting their homes. We've found carers who admit they get $600 a week for children in wheelchairs or with feeding tubes so they ask for two or three of those.

We've reported on nappies piled in the corners of the room and broken windows and children barefoot, with nits, and places where the stench is so bad even professional cleaners refuse to go inside. We've reported on children who have died in foster care, and children who have come out of it only able to eat with their hands.

We've been lashed for our coverage but now the cat is out of the bag. Again.

A Victorian report into foster care says many children have been physically and sexually abused by carers. They've had limbs broken and been knocked unconscious. They've been physically assaulted or raped and witnessed their carers selling drugs to other children.

And how has this been allowed to happen? Because the "screening and assessment of carers" isn't what it ought to be. And why not? Because all states are being forced to shove kids into any foster homes they can find to cope with the huge numbers of children, 33,000 and rising, now living out of home.

If we don't do something about it soon - by bringing down the number of children in care, and by allowing those with dreadful parents to be adopted - we might as well get ready for the next stirring, and pointless, national apology. Only this time we won't be able to say we didn't know.