The Queensland Government has today announced a Commission of Inquiry into the Child Safety System. 

The decision comes following the uncovering of long-term systemic failures that have led the Government to decide an independent investigation was a critical step in the reform process. 

The Commission of Inquiry will be led by Paul Anastassiou KC, with its broad terms of reference: 

• Reforming the Residential Care System: investigate models of care and the factors contributing to the growth and reliance on a billion-dollar residential care sector. 

• Repairing the system: reviewing the effectiveness of Queensland’s child safety system to keep children safe. 

• Safer Children: failures both systemic and policy that have impeded the ability of the Department responsible for the Child Safety portfolio (the Department) to provide support to families and protection to children at risk of harm in Queensland. 

• Safer Communities: evaluate the effectiveness of the Department as a corporate parent and whether it is able to meet community expectations around parenting. 

• Delivery Failures: prosecute failures of Government and elected Ministers to implement policy to keep Queensland children and the community safe.  

• Legislative Reform: reviewing Queensland legislation about the protection of children, including the Child Protection Act 1999 and Adoption Act 2009.

 
Stark findings of a 2024 Census of more than 3,000 children in care is sobering in its severity and significance and shows the generational trauma of some of the State’s most vulnerable young people living in out-of-home care. 

The 2024 Census found that children who were entering the out-of-home care system had suffered significant trauma: 

• 11% had been sexually abused 

• 46% had been physically abused 

• 83% had suffered emotional abuse 

• 88% had been neglected 

• 68% had been exposed to domestic violence 

• 69% had experienced three or more abuse types 

Children who enter care after their 10th birthday are more likely to have mental health issues and self-harm, whereas children who enter care younger are more likely to have a disability and higher rates of limited intellectual functioning/development delay. 

The children who live in residential care have significantly higher needs than those in foster or kinship care: 

• 42% have limited to severely limited intellectual functioning/developmental delay 

• 51% have a diagnosed or suspected disability 

• 40% have a diagnosed or suspected mental illness 

• 48% have extreme instability/extreme emotional responses that limit functioning 

• 44% self-harm now or in the past 

• 22% have attempted suicide 

• 61% have been excluded or suspended from an education facility in the past 

• 52% have poor social skills/disconnected 

Almost a third of children in care have unmet support needs in relation to their mental health and two in ten have unmet needs in relation to their disability. 

There were 650 children living in residential care in December 2015, that number has grown to 2,212 in December 2024, including 116 children aged five and under living in these homes. 

Of the children in residential care, with all their needs and traumatic histories, 73 per cent will be placed in four or more homes during their time in care and more than half of children living in residential care will spend more than five years living in these homes. 

As of December 2024, 12,497 children are living in out-of-home care in Queensland, 818 more than December 2023: 

• 6,112 live with kinship carers 

• 4,173 live with foster carers 

• 2,212 live in residential care

In the 2014/15 budget residential care services cost $200 million, in this financial year it will $1.12 billion.  

Taxpayers are paying hundreds of thousands of dollars per child, per year to live in residential care across the state. 

The billion-dollar industry has blown out to such an extreme state that one teen’s care expenses have grown to $2.6 million, another teen costs $2.3 million per year. 

The Department of Child Safety became a price taker, instead of a price setter, with an increasing reliance on Individual Placement Support (IPS), which is intended to be a short-term bridging response until a more stable Outsourced Service Delivery (OSD) placement is available. 

In recent years, IPS placements have vastly increased in number and in placement length, creating a hugely inflated cost for Government and a higher risk for the child. 

In the 2014/15 budget the spend on IPS was $82 million, this financial year it will cost taxpayers $766 million. 

In the same period OSD grew from $118 million to $354 million. 

The Queensland Government has ordered a full forensic audit into one for-profit residential care provider after it was uncovered that dividends had been paid to their three shareholders totalling $5.25 million last financial year. 

This same organisation receives tens of millions of dollars from the State Government to run residential care services, with financial statements also revealing they increased their management fees by 1000 per cent. 

The timeframes set out by the Department to start an investigation are 24 hours for children in immediate risk and then 5 days and 10 days. 

At December 2024 the proportion of investigations commenced for 5 and 10 days were extremely low: 

• 24hrs
  • 5,304 investigations commenced
  • 92.2% of investigations commenced within timeframe

• 5 days
  • 14,487 investigations commenced
  • 19% of investigations commenced within timeframe

• 10 days
  • 11,663 investigations commenced
  • 18.6% of investigations commenced within timeframe

The number of cases child safety officers were tasked to investigate over the past decade continued to grow. 

The Commission will be tasked with investigating the case work and caseloads of child safety officers to determine if frontline staff are resourced and supported to do their work, while outlining deficiencies. 

The 2024 Census can be accessed here.