Doing the right thing by Australia’s children

In today’s post, Deb Tsorbaris discusses the sobering findings of the landmark Australian Child Maltreatment Study (ACMS) released in April this year, and the need for policymakers and the child services sector to respond swiftly. The study reveals that child maltreatment is widespread in Australia and associated with early and persistent harm. Deb is the CEO at The Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare, (@CFECFW), Victoria’s peak body for child and family services.

For a country that prides itself on being progressive and punching above its weight in so many different cultural and sporting arenas internationally, Australia performs poorly when it comes to child maltreatment rates.

We now have a set of data that gives us a clear picture of child maltreatment in Australia, and we have no choice but to act.

Recently the Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare gathered social services leaders, and federal and state government representatives to advance a coordinated response to the nation’s first Australian Child Maltreatment Study.

The overall findings of the landmark ACMS research are consistent with our coalface work. We have long known and struggled with the fact that many children in Australia experience abuse and neglect during childhood. What we didn’t know, until the release of the study in April this year, was the extent of the problem.

When we talk about child maltreatment, we’re talking about five types of experience – physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, and exposure to domestic violence.

The ACMS research, undertaken by a consortium of researchers led by the Queensland University of Technology, shows that child maltreatment is widespread in Australia, with devastating consequences for their mental health and health risk behaviours, now and as adults.

The study showed that 62.2 percent of Australians reported experiences of child maltreatment in their childhood, with almost half (48 percent) of these Australians meeting the criteria for at least one of the four mental health disorders measured – major depressive disorder, generalised anxiety disorder, alcohol use disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Child maltreatment is also a gendered problem disproportionately affecting girls. More than one in three girls experienced child sexual abuse (37.3 percent): twice the rate of boys. More than one in three girls also experienced emotional abuse (35.7 percent): 1.4 times the rate of boys.

The consequences of child maltreatment in Australia can be seen in the concerning rates of self-harm among young adults aged 16-24, with those who experienced any form of child maltreatment being 3.5 times more likely than their peers to have self-harmed in the previous year, and 4.5 times more likely to have attempted suicide.

We will continue to fail our children and young people if we can’t respond quickly to these findings.

A national, coordinated approach is needed if we are to raise children who are safe, nurtured, and able to thrive. The Centre has joined Federal and State Government and social services sector leaders calling for a National Taskforce to end child maltreatment.

Given the vulnerability of girls to sexual and emotional abuse, we need to strengthen our approach to the teaching of respectful relationships.

We need a reset of gender norms that spreads beyond schools and deep into our communities.

We need to look at the relationships and attitudes to women we are modelling to young people – in our media, in parliament, in workplaces, and in homes.

It’s important that we understand not just the consequences of physical and sexual abuses, but the nuanced ramifications of emotional abuse, neglect, and exposure to domestic violence.

We must focus on primary prevention and secondary prevention of all forms of child maltreatment, starting with pre- and post-natal education for parents.

We can and must invest more, and invest more wisely, in universal prevention at the population level, and in targeted interventions for children and young people at high risk, including easy and affordable access to mental health services.

Through its gold-standard evidence base, the ACMS research gives us a chance to have a national conversation about our children and to use the research to guide our actions.

It also gives us a clear blueprint for action, which is something policymakers and the child services sector have not had before.

Thanks to this study we know exactly where to direct our energy, where the most urgent needs lie, and where we can have the most immediate short and long-term impacts. We also know where we have already been making a positive difference: in recent years, physical abuse has declined, as has sexual abuse by some types of offender. We can and must continue this progress.

We owe it to our children and young people, and our entire Australian society, to accept the recommendations from the ACMS research and work together to bring about real, impactful changes to people’s lives and an end to child maltreatment.

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About The Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare
Deb Tsorbaris is CEO of the Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare. The Centre is Victoria’s peak body for child and family services. The Centre provides sector training and facilitates and publishes research. We also advocate for better transitions for young people leaving state care, and better supports for struggling families.

About the Australian Child Maltreatment Study
The Australian Child Maltreatment Study (ACMS) was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (2019-2023) APP1158750 with additional funding and contributions from the Australian Government. It was conducted by a consortium of researchers from Australia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. In partnership with the Social Research Centre, the ACMS collected data from 8503 Australians during 2021. The data collected provide the first nationally representative prevalence estimates of the five types of child maltreatment in Australia, and their associated health outcomes through life.

Content moderator: Sue Olney