NSW Auditor-General calls for child protection reforms

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The New South Wales auditor general has released a damning assessment of the state's child protection system. The audit-office has found three quarters of at-risk children are falling off the government's radar and is calling for urgent reform.

Transcript

00:00 The New South Wales Auditor-General says the child protection system is inefficient, ineffective

00:07 and unsustainable. Out of the 112,000 children deemed to be at risk, three quarters had their

00:15 cases closed without being visited by a caseworker. The Department of Communities and Justice

00:20 doesn't know the outcomes for those children. The report also found emergency care in hotels

00:27 is costing $830,000 per child each year. The total cost of hotel accommodation tripled

00:34 from $100 million in 2018 to $300 million in 2022. A parallel report looking specifically

00:42 at First Nations children found they account for 45% of those in out of home care, despite

00:48 being only 7% of the population. The Auditor-General is now calling on the government to urgently

00:55 assess the safety of all children in out of home care and commit to major improvements

01:00 across the board. The Department says it will accept in principle the recommendations of

01:05 both reports.

01:06 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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