Complex lives, complex needs, complex service systems: Community worker perspectives on the needs of families involved with ACT care and protection services

Abstract

The main contribution of the research is to demonstrate that parents and families in contact with community workers are dealing with complex needs, are socially marginalised and stigmatised. They are observed by community workers to have little to no trust that they will be treated equitably by child protection workers. Community workers overwhelming reported arbitrariness, inconsistency and low transparency in the ACT CPS. In many of their cases, community workers failed to see processes as fair or outcomes as good. For both families and community workers engaged with child protection authorities there was a sense of powerlessness and despair: Stigma was so great that parents were fighting against the odds to win respect from child protection workers for the steps they took to be better parents, and to convince the child protection authorities that their lives had changed and they were able to care for their children. Show more