When out of home care fails to care

In October last year, a report to the New South Wales Government found the out-of-home care system in NSW was not fit for purpose and was failing to meet the needs of children and young people.

The results of the System Review into Out-of-Home Care report were no surprise to not-for-profit organisation Adopt Change, who operate in New England.

Adopt Change is the name behind the My Forever Family Program in New South Wales, and in 2024, supported about 60 households in the New England and Northern NSW through its programs.

“The report highlights challenges that we’ve been aware of for years,” Adopt Change CEO Renee Leigh Carter says.

“While there are areas of progress, significant improvements are still needed to ensure the needs of children are consistently met and prioritising stability, healing and long-term outcomes.”

“Children shouldn’t spend their childhood in a system, with the government as a parent. They need to grow up in family homes.”

There are close to 14,000 children in what is known as “out-of-home care” in New South Wales through the system administered by the Department of Communities and Justice. Forty-five percent of those children and young people are Aboriginal.

The report notes that in 30 June, 2024, 7,632 of these children and young people were in “relative/kinship care” staying with a family member, 5,162 were in foster care, and 904 were in residential care. Residential care includes programs like intensive therapeutic care and significant disability care.

There were also disturbing results included in another recent report – the Special Inquiry into Children and Young People in Alternative Care Arrangements (ACA), by the Office of the Advocate for Children and Young People. The report found worrying statistics about the use of hotels, motels and other settings for emergency out-of-home care (OOHC).

As of 30 June 2023, there were 118 children and young people in ACAs, including 26 children and young people in hotels and motels, 37 in serviced apartments and 55 in short-term rentals including caravan parks.

“It is reported that in the 2022-23 financial year, ACAs cost NSW taxpayers approximately $100 million, with DCJ [Department of Communities and Justice] data indicating that the average cost of an ACA is $965,000 per annum,” the report said.

In plain English, that is a cost of close to $1 million a child a year.

The report found most of those children and young people were in “emergency care” for more than three months.

Both reports concluded that the system is, simply, failing children who are already living through the trauma of being taken from their home or being without a home.

According to the System Review into Out-of-Home Care, the NSW system is “overly complex, fragmented and slow to respond in the best interests of children and young people”.

To add to the problems, NSW is losing the mainstay of the care system – foster parents.

The review found there were close to 14 percent fewer authorised carers in NSW in 2024 than in 2021.

A September 2024 report for the Association of Children’s Welfare Agencies (ACWA) said the “traditional pools of foster carers are increasingly drying up”.

“…trying to squeeze enough foster carers out of the current and future population of NSW is very much an uphill battle against demographic trends,” the report said.

The report found that between 2021 and 2024:

• The number of authorised foster carers decreased by 13 per cent
• The number of carers who identify as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander decreased by 11 per cent; and
• The number of annual applicants fell by 17 per cent.

The New England Times approached a number of foster carers in the region. All of them reported they had difficulties with the system, but none were willing to go on the record – even anonymously – due to their fear of violating formal agreements with the NSW Government.

The System Review into Out of Home Care report found one of the biggest problems was no one was listening to the voices of children and young people, families and carers.

“Carers play a vital role in supporting children and young people in care, but they often feel undervalued and unsupported,” the report said. “Many carers we met with expressed frustration about limited communication, insufficient financial support, inadequate advocacy within the system and a lack of involvement in key decisions regarding children in their care”

The report’s conclusion was scathing.

“Regrettably, we found a system characterised by a profound lack of accountability and ineffective oversight,” it said. “A system founded on flawed assumptions and an incorrect cost basis, resulting in a hybrid model largely devoid of robust evidence-based practices and sound fiscal architecture.”

It came up with 13 key recommendations, including: inter-departmental agreement to drive reform into the system;  a whole-of-government integrated funding strategy supporting early intervention, family preservation and out-of-home care systems concurrently; an accountability framework; mechanisms and process to listen to the voice of children, young people, carers and families.

In December last year, Minister for Families and Communities, Kate Washington said the Government had been “open and honest about the spiralling out-of-home care system we inherited”.

“It’s shocking that some out-of-home care providers are failing to provide basic supports to children, despite being paid hundreds of thousands, and in some cases, millions, of taxpayer dollars to do so,” she said.

“Right now, we know taxpayer money is not always flowing to the children who need it.”

“…We have a lot of work ahead of us to ensure increased accountability and transparency translates to better outcomes for children and young people.”

She said the government had already gone some way to “stabilising” the system through moves including a total ban on Alternative Care Arrangements (ACAs) by this month (March 2025), reducing the number of children placed in ACAs and reducing the number of children placed in all types of high-cost emergency arrangements.

Adopt Change CEO Renee Leigh Carter says the report recommendations need to be implemented “with urgency, adequate funding and accountability” in New South Wales, and welcomed the government’s initial response.

“The government’s response is a positive step, which now needs to translate into swift, meaningful action,” she says.

“Addressing key areas like early intervention, permanency and support for children, carers and families will be critical to driving real change.”

She says the current budget focus needs to shift.

“Our work in finding more carer homes for children is becoming more difficult as Australian homes face the challenges of economic pressures which makes the role less viable,” she says. “Further supports are needed to ensure this vital role in our society is achievable.”

“More funding needs to be spent on support, with less spent on crisis end – the shift will benefit everyone.”

In 2024, Adopt Change recruited more than 80 potential new carer households in the New England area to provide care for children and young people across the area.

The call for change and more support for out-of-home care is happening across the country, with a plea by the National Foster and Kinship Care Collective in January this year to the Federal Treasurer stating Australia’s state-based out-of-home care sector was in crisis.

“At the state level, funding is not being spent at the prevention and support end of the system but focussed on high-cost crisis options delivering terrible outcomes,” the collective said in a pre-Budget submission to the Treasurer.

Among their requests was a call for “appropriate compensation” for foster and kinship carers.

The National Foster Care Sustainability Group has also called on the federal government to: prioritise access to medical and therapeutic support, and to reduce financial pressure and provide better leave entitlements for foster carers. The requests have been supported by Anglicare Australia.

This week’s Federal Budget has, however, left supporters of foster carers and reform of the out-of-home care system underwhelmed.

Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare CEO Deb Tsorbaris said it was disappointing the Budget included “no provisions to prioritise medical, therapeutic and developmental support for children in foster care”.

“We have asked the government to step up for children in foster care and prioritise their health and developmental needs through a Healthcare Gold Card system,” Ms Tsorbaris said.

“This group of young people face significantly higher physical, mental, and developmental health challenges than their peers, and many struggle to access the healthcare they require, leading to long-term chronic conditions, particularly in rural and regional areas where primary healthcare services are limited.”

“There is nothing in this budget to support children in foster care or their carers.”

Adopt Change’s Renee Leigh Carter says the loser in this unwieldy and unworkable system is the child.

“Ultimately, the system exists to identify children at significant risk and protect them,” she says.

“Unfortunately, complexity, underfunding and bureaucracy can result in the system compounding the issues for the child when they are not provided with home-based care and access to supports to heal from their trauma.”