Two lost, five sleeping rough: State care system’s missing kids

Police are currently searching for two children missing from residential care, the state government has revealed, as its child safety review begins three weeks of public hearings.

An audit of Queensland’s foster, kinship, and residential care system in July found almost 800 children were unaccounted for.

Child Safety Minister Amanda Camm said 75 per cent were “frequently missing, absent, or both” during routine headcounts.

“It’s over 500 children across the system that, at one point in time, my department didn’t know where they were,” Camm said.

“When we’re talking about complex children – complex adolescents – that have an interface with both youth justice system or... a disability, or a mental health condition, that has an impact on their own safety, but it also has an impact on our community safety.”

The audit found more than 130 of the children missing from residential care were subject to a youth justice order or on bail.

About one in seven of the almost 800 missing children and teenagers also reported feeling unsafe or having been involved in a conflict with another person living at their placement.

An additional 325 children had a diagnosed disability or mental health disorder, and 269 were suspected to have similar disorders but had not yet been diagnosed.

Children reported as missing to child safety officers most frequently stayed with their parents, which made up about half of cases, and a quarter stayed with either adult siblings or extended family.

About eight of the 772 total children and teenagers reported missing were found to be sleeping rough, and about 25 were moving between locations.

Camm said the two missing children were both teenagers, and the Department of Families, Seniors, Disability Services and Child Safety was in “constant communication” with police working to find the missing teens.

Based off the findings, Camm said the state would increase information sharing between child safety officers and police – giving more resources and greater power to police searching for children leaving the residential care system or “self-placing” themselves with family members.

“When I announced the audit into self-placing children, I said it was unacceptable to have one vulnerable child missing or absent from their state-placed care,” Camm said.

“We must care and know where these children are.”

Camm said police would have “fast, rapid information regarding that child’s child safety history”, and said the state would trial placing child safety officers with select police units in Caboolture, Logan, and Cairns.

“Queensland Police [will] have at their disposal a resource – which will be a child safety officer – who can make assessments alongside police as to both the history, but also the crisis response,” Camm said.

Camm said the trial could help cut down time taken by police to find a suitable home to place a child in, after having an encounter with the police.

“I know that there is complexity in regards to children, their needs, and what we’ve inherited, particularly in the broken residential care system… that is why we have tasked and why we have called for a commission of inquiry,” she said.

Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.