New report finds vulnerable children are being targeted by paedophile rings
ANGELICA SNOWDEN - JUNE 24, 2021
Urgent calls are being made to reform Victoria’s residential care system for children, amid news young people are fleeing temporary homes at alarming rates and are easy prey for predators seeking to sexually or criminally exploit them.
The damning findings — which also revealed organised paedophile rings are actively targeting young people in out-of-home care — were reported by an inquiry tabled in parliament on Thursday.
Principal Commissioner for children and young people Liana Buchanan found young people who go missing are considered “street smart” and therefore the risks connected to their disappearance are downplayed.
“There is no consistent approach to reporting or recording children who are absent or missing from care,” she said in a foreword.
“Many workers recognise that the current system drives a dispiriting and damaging cycle of absence, harm and brief return for many high-risk young people, yet there is a sense of resignation and powerlessness in the face of these systemic failures.
Child protection opposition spokesman Matt Bach said the state is in the “grip of a child protection crisis”.
“We already knew a record 65 children known to child protection died last year. Through this new report we’ve learnt more about the shameful failures of the Andrews Labor Government, with vulnerable children being successfully targeted by organised paedophile rings, and raped,” he said.
“The Andrews Labor Government must change its crisis-driven approach into supporting our children and young people to prevention and early intervention.”
The inquiry found care given to children in residential placements is in “many cases inadequate”. The agencies responsible for residential care include the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing, Victoria Police and residential service providers.
In the 18 months to March 31 last year, 37 per cent of missing children incident briefs contained reports of sexual exploitation.
In the same time period, girls and young women were reported as missing at 2.5 times the rate boys and young men were. But it is likely that boys and young men are under-represented in incident reporting.
A group of 12 children also appeared to go missing more frequently than others, accounting for 33 per cent of all primary absent reports. Half of those reports concerned three young people in particular.
There was a spike in missing children reports when state of emergency restrictions were announced in Victoria last year amid the Covid-19 pandemic, with numbers of absent client incidents up by 36 per cent in the six months to August 2020 compared to the same period in 2019.
The inquiry found the system used to monitor missing children is “inconsistent” and as a result authorities do not know how many children go missing, how long they disappear for and what happens to them during their absence.
The report called for urgent and systemic change in the system, which should recognise how consequences of trauma can drive young people away from their placements.
Child protection minister Luke Donnellan said there was a “long way to go” to improve the state’s child protection system.
“Children and young people in residential care have complex backgrounds, with a history of trauma and abuse – so they need extra support to feel safe, stable and settled in their placements,” he said.
“We’re boosting the workforce and expanding new care models for children and young people – including wrap-around services, comprehensive mental health support, better connection to community and country, and smaller, more family-like care settings.”
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/new-report-finds-vulnerable-children-are-being-targeted-by-paedophile-rings/news-story/5ef8975e6a8ebe6d45fecd9f965cb152