We failed them - territory to overhaul child welfare

We failed them - territory to overhaul child welfare
LINDSAY MURDOCH DARWIN
22 Oct, 2010 04:00 AM

"Typhoon of official neglect" ... child abuse reports doubled after the intervention.

Australia- KON VATSKALIS, the Northern Territory's Minister for Children and Families, admits he will have to tear down the system for protecting Aboriginal children from abuse and neglect and start again.

"The department has been demoralised … we are now going to rebuild from scratch and we have to leave the old ideologies [of child protection] at the door," he said.

His was a startling admission of failure. In the three years since the biggest federal intervention in 50 years of government in the territory, agencies are struggling to come to terms with endemic mistreatment of children.

Widespread sexual and physical abuse of indigenous children was identified three years ago by the Howard government. This week, in the wake of another government report, it was labelled a typhoon of official neglect.

Vatskalis and the territory's Chief Minister, Paul Henderson, offer few excuses. They admit to being overwhelmed by the scale of abuse and neglect and shocked by the findings of bureaucratic bungling. They promise action. Full Story

Communism fails every time, and everywhere it's tried.