Kim O’KEEFFE (Shepparton) (18:07): I rise to speak on the Children, Youth and Families Amendment (Supporting Stable and Strong Families) Bill 2025. This is a bill that seeks to make a number of amendments to the Children, Youth and Families Act 2005 to create a supporting stable and strong families scheme to provide for collective responsibility and a whole-of-government approach to supporting child wellbeing and safety. I am sure that everyone in this place shares a fundamental goal that stable families and safe children has to be a priority and that we must be making the changes necessary to ensure that the most vulnerable people in our communities have the support and safeguards that they need. There are many families and children who are in need of support in our communities. It is critical that we provide the resources that ensure that the right frameworks are in place. There have been incidents of children and families who have not had the support that they need. When there is family breakdown, the impact can be devastating and in some cases even tragic. We know that there are issues within the child protection system itself today. Like others, my office has had many people contact us, and some of the incidents are alarming and distressing. We must do everything we can to ensure that children within the system get the utmost care and protections afforded to them. We cannot expect families to reunify and children to be safe and stable without the services that actually make that possible, such as accessible housing, culturally appropriate treatment programs, early intervention supports and full support for carers.
The government has framed this bill as nation-leading and as a means to create a whole-of-government response to support vulnerable children and their families. I absolutely agree that child protection must be a shared responsibility. However, the concern is that these reforms do not go far enough to make the changes needed for families and for the already overburdened child protection system. Stakeholders generally supported the intent of this bill and saw it as a step in the right direction. However, many raised their concerns that plans and reports alone would not lead to real change, especially without clear accountability, stronger collaboration and proper funding, and most stakeholders raised concerns about inadequate consultation.
Stakeholders also warned that trying to cover too many groups may reduce the focus on those with the highest needs.
Despite its broad goals, the bill mainly sets up a system for planning and reporting. It does not require departments to take action, create legal rights or step in when outcomes are not improving. The scheme lacks enforceability obligations. Its practical impact will depend heavily on the quality of the supporting stable and strong families (SSSF) plans, the willingness of portfolios to collaborate and future resourcing decisions. Collaboration is encouraged but not required, and coordination is mostly left to high-level guidance in planned preparation from the Children’s Services Coordination Board.
It is often the unsung heroes in our communities who are doing incredible work in this space. Just today I had Melanie from the Shepparton community house here on the steps of Parliament advocating for continued funding. What I did not know about Melanie until we chatted over lunch is that she cares for a young Indigenous teenage boy along with her own seven children. She said the plan was that he only stayed for about a month, and a year and a half later he is still there. He has stability and a family who care for him. Another very special woman in my community – her name is Wendy Dow – has been a foster carer with Berry Street for more than 35 years, opening up her home and heart to more than 300 children during that time. She is a remarkable woman, caring for children in their time of need on top of her own four children and three permanent care children. In a recent article published by the Shepparton News Wendy said:
Being a foster carer doesn’t come without its challenges – children missing their families, struggling with dysregulated behaviour and not knowing how to cope with their own emotions.
Also in the article Wendy shared a story of a little girl she looked after for 3½ years who went home to her family after lots of hard work from the child’s biological mother. Wendy mentions her ongoing support to that child and the mother to this day. She is such an incredible, caring and giving woman, and how fortunate are we to have someone like Wendy as a foster carer. It is foster carers like Wendy and her family that provide stability, a safe space and time for children and for their families to get the assistance that they need. We know that the need is growing for foster carers, and as a government we need to provide the support and assistance needed.
I would also like to acknowledge the team at Shepparton Berry Street, who do such great work, offering a range of services and support, including family violence support, trauma services, out-of-home care, and parenting and family services, and of course there are many others. I have also mentioned my friend Aunty Faye Lynam in this place before, a remarkable Indigenous woman who during her life fostered many children, and not just Indigenous children. She advocated for respect and dignity in child protection and the youth justice system. Sadly, she passed away two years ago, but I remember her stories of the children she fostered and her genuine love and care and hope for their future and the future of their families.
It is really sad when families are separated and pulled apart – the impact of my own experience of family breakdown as a child – and there is that sadness when your siblings leave the home and that separation and confusion. I did not see one of my older sisters for four years when she left at the age of 14 and went to live with a family in Melbourne. I was 10 years old, and she was my big sister who looked after me, and I do always remember that night when she was picked up. I left the family home as a teenager, leaving behind my younger siblings and moving in with friends and family initially, then in and out of a range of accommodation. I look back and think how extraordinary it was that that was just allowed to happen. There were seven of us, and most of us left the family home as young teenagers. My parents needed help. My dad had mental health issues, and both parents had alcohol addiction. Back then we did not get the family assistance we needed, and my parents did not look for it. I look back on those times and how hard it was for all of my siblings.
We need accessible family support services and early intervention. If we can have the support mechanisms in place that help families through the challenges that they are facing, having those systems in place will lead to the prevention of family breakdown and positive outcomes. Also, the safety of the child must be the highest priority. Every child deserves a safe and stable home and a family that can care for them, not to be lost in a system that leaves them and their families behind. We also need to ensure children get counselling and mental health support, as it can have a lifelong impact and ongoing trauma and be a traumatic time in their life, not only during that time but in the future.
Foster carers and anyone who takes on the care of a child take on an enormous responsibility. We must support them in every way possible. They are the safety net that catches many children. I will also note the response from the Foster Care Association of Victoria to this bill. The FCAV welcome the introduction of this bill, but they are concerned that the objectives of the bill cannot be meaningfully realised unless there is substantial investment from the government to ensure that timely access to critical support services is available to families. The FCAV also in their response went on to say:
Without dedicated new funding to expand service capacity, reduce waiting times, and ensure equitable access across the state, the reforms proposed in this Bill risk becoming symbolic rather than transformative.
A well-resourced system that supports families, carers and practitioners should also be front of mind when it comes to decision-making. They also raised concerns that:
The SSSF Bill does not mandate consultation with foster carers during the development of departmental plans and leaves open the possibility that critical aspects of child protection service delivery may be overlooked or inconsistently addressed.
They also said:
Children in care do not experience services in silos, and so neither do carers. Education, health, mental health, disability, justice, and child protection often intersect in the everyday experiences of children and their carers. When coordination and resources are deficient, carers absorb the impact, and the children experience further disruption. Coordination is central to this Bill, yet carers are not named as SSSF partners, calling into question how success will be tested in reality at the placement level. If the SSSF plans do not translate into meaningful, timely and coordinated action, carers bear the burden, supporting children through delays and unclear escalation pathways and potentially resulting in crisis-driven responses. Consultation with carers can ground outcome measures in lived reality, identify where accountability becomes diffuse, and test whether coordination is operational rather than aspirational. Without this lens, progress may be reported on paper, while instability persists in homes, until carers can no longer buffer the system’s gaps for the children in their care.
They also raised concerns regarding carer recruitment and retention:
Carer recruitment and retention, for example, is critical to system capacity and placement stability. Without direct consultation with carers on factors influencing recruitment and retention, plans may fail to include meaningful objectives or outcome measures to address these systemic challenges.
It is critical that we do work through this bill, that we do aim for better outcomes, that we do make sure that the actions are accountable and that we see the impacts on children’s lives is a positive outcome. We must make sure that we keep forcing and really trying hard to support the carers, the children and everyone that is impacted. I will finish my contribution there, but there is still so much more that needs to be done.