VCOSS welcomes the increased investment in services for children and families in the 2009-10 State Budget. This investment is one of the most significant in a number of years and builds on recent reforms. While welcome, more needs to be done to achieve significant improvements for all children and young people who are at-risk.
The budget included an overall injection of $159.8 million over four years into the child protection and family services system. This investment has translated to a real effective increase of 8.14% on the 2008-09 child protection and family services funding targets.
In the VCOSS 2009-10 State Budget Submission, VCOSS called for increased investment and support for children and young people in out-of-home care. In the Budget $134.7 million has been allocated to out-of-home care reform.
Specific initiatives advocated for by VCOSS and our members and included under this reform package include:
Other initiatives in the reform package include:
This additional investment signals the Victorian Government’s commitment to intensive therapeutic care, and is recognition that high quality care is required to achieve improved outcomes for vulnerable children and young people.
However, the demand for out-of-home care places continues to rise at unprecedented levels, creating an urgent need for more placements system-wide. Demand for services for highly vulnerable families also have high waiting lists. VCOSS hopes that future budgets will build on this reform package and provide further increases to placement numbers and early intervention family support services to provide support to families before they reach crisis point.
The budget included $14.65 million over four years for child protection emergency and crisis response services, as well as $10.4 million over four years to provide improved access to sexual assault counselling for children and young people. This funding will reduce waiting times and meet rising demand.
VCOSS called for and welcomed the investment, as part of the out-of-home care reforms, in delivering cultural competency training for community service organisations to ensure that the needs of Indigenous children and young people are better met. Due to the lack of sufficient Aboriginal-specific family services many Indigenous children and families access generalist services. Cultural competency training will assist generalist services to provide more culturally responsive services for Indigenous children and their families.
VCOSS also called for Koori Maternity Services to be expanded and welcomes the $1 million to improve Koori Maternity Services in the municipalities of Bendigo, Darebin and Mildura, which is a positive step to improving supports for Indigenous mothers and their children. The availability of Koori Maternity Services has led to more Indigenous women accessing antenatal care earlier in pregnancy.
VCOSS welcomes the significant investment in mental health to assist in achieving the Because Mental Health Matters: Victorian Mental Health Reform Strategy 2009-2019.
VCOSS called for an increased investment into prevention and early intervention mental health supports for children and young people, particularly at a universal services level. The Early in life: improving mental health outcomes for children, young people and their families, which has provided $21.3 million over four years, will go part of the way to improving supports.
As part of the Early in life strategy, the youth mental health redesign initiative which has been allocated $13.8 million over four years, will hopefully provide a greater focus on early intervention and VCOSS hopes that the four pilot sites promised under this initiative will inform future budget funding for a state-wide investment in early intervention.
VCOSS also called for and welcomes the expansion of Child Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) to work with young people up to the age of 25. VCOSS proposed the expansion of CAMHS eligibility in our submission to the Because Mental Health Matters reform process. This expansion will mean that the focus will be on transitions for young people and will provide better continuity of supports.
Other initiatives announced as part of the Early in life strategy include $2.9 million over four years for a new youth justice mental health initiative and $4.5 million over four years for new CAMHS in Schools Early Action Teams, reinforce the important role that universal services have in improving outcomes for vulnerable children and young people.