Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I do not think there is any doubt that it is an absolute priority for this government to protect children from serious abuse and neglect, and I do not think there is any doubt that there is not a person in this chamber for whom it is not a priority. I certainly take on board Senator Polley’s comments about working together with the government to ensure that we get the right outcome. That is the goal. It is not about politics. It is about ensuring that we protect those children right across this nation who are relying on us, not just as parliamentarians but as adults in this community, to ensure that they are safe. They deserve that, and we have a real responsibility to ensure that we deliver that.

This government has a very strong commitment to a national approach. Although the federal government has a significant range of measures in place, it is not just about the federal government. It is about working with the opposition, the states and territories, community groups, parents and organisations right across the country to ensure that we get the right outcomes. The government has committed around $17 billion to supporting families and children. About $10 million of that goes each year towards early intervention and prevention.

The government has a real focus on recognising that early intervention and prevention is vitally important in ensuring the safety of our children. We have a range of measures in place, such as the REACh program—Responding Early Assisting Children—which funds 41 services that support children and parents in vulnerable families, those who are experiencing significant transitions or those who are at risk of child abuse, neglect or other crises. We have the Indigenous children program, which emphasises early intervention and prevention and focuses on the delivery of services to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, families and communities and builds and strengthens their resilience and support networks. We have the National Child Protection Clearinghouse, which is provided through the Australian Institute of Family Studies to get information on child protection activities and research out to professionals and organisations in this field. It is important that we note all those programs, because they are only a part of what the government is doing to ensure that we have the right measures in place to do as much as we possibly can to address this issue.

One organisation I would like to focus on in the area of government working with community organisations is NAPCAN, which was founded in 1987 by Rosemary Sinclair and Christine Stewart. I congratulate them both on their vision, their dedication and their foresight in setting up NAPCAN and recognising the need for an organisation like that. It was created to establish lines of communication between government and organisations, agencies and professionals so that we could have a real focus on this very significant issue. In 2005, NAPCAN released its new strategic plan. It is important to note that because, again, it is not just about governments and what we are doing; it is about working together as a community to ensure that we get the right outcomes.

Last week was National Child Protection Week, and we saw funding of $250,000 from the government ensure that we raise awareness. Last week a report stated that about one in three people suspected instances of child abuse, but 43 per cent of those did not report those suspicions. I think it is so important to raise community awareness of this issue, and it is through things like National Child Protection Week that awareness will be raised and, hopefully, this very serious issue will be addressed.

Many of the mainstream programs that the government funds contribute to ensuring that we have a real goal of child abuse prevention. It is not just the direct programs—the sorts of things that I mentioned earlier—but the mainstream programs as well, such as health, social security, housing, disability services and family policy. We need to adopt a holistic approach to this. It is not just about specifically targeting child abuse and those very specific measures we put in place; it is about the broader environment that those children are living in. We know that, when families are under stress, that is far more likely, unfortunately, to be a factor in child abuse. It is about issues such as poverty, unemployment, illness and disability, so we need to have a very broad-ranging approach to that, and this government certainly has that.

If we do not address those things then we are not going to be able to address the issue itself. So I believe it is vitally important that we take a very broad view to make sure we encompass all those things. We need to recognise the factors that result in instances of child abuse and do everything we can to minimise those factors. If we do that and combine it with early intervention and prevention, working collectively with all sides of government and the community, then we can make sure we get the right outcomes in this area. The more we assist families to cope, the more they are able to raise their children in a caring environment.

I am a mother of two children. I know that many senators in this place are parents. You cannot help but feel it very deeply when you hear of instances of child abuse—and you do not have to be a parent to feel deep emotion when you hear about instances of child abuse. The onus is on us to work together, to work with the community and to work with the groups. The onus is on us to ensure that we have a plan together which does not get distracted by politics and that we have a very clear path forward to ensure that our children, in this wonderful country of ours, have safe and happy lives.