A 12-year-old girl charged with murder while under the care of the state exposed “some of the most profound service system failures” Victoria’s children’s commissioner has seen, a damning report has revealed.
Victoria’s Commission for Children and Young People’s (CCYP) annual report, tabled in parliament on Thursday, also revealed it received notifications regarding the deaths of 43 children known to the system in 2023-24.
The report described significant service failures in the case of a 12-year-old girl, referred to by the pseudonym WD, who had been in the out-of-home care system for many years. In May this year, the charges against WD were dropped.
She had a “history of significant childhood trauma”, an intellectual disability and was being sexually exploited while missing from out-of-home care, the report said.
Victoria’s principal commissioner for children and young people, Liana Buchanan, said WD’s case exposed “some of the most profound service system failures I have seen”, with “devastating consequences”.
Buchanan told Guardian Australia she shared her investigation with Jacinta Allan – the first time she had personally provided a copy to the premier – to highlight the findings of the “heartbreaking” case.
“I wanted to make sure that the details of this case and the failings in this child’s experience were known to everybody who mattered,” she said.
“This is a child with a trauma background and complex needs, and instead of safety and stability she’s had 10 different residences, dozens of different workers, including some against whom she’s disclosed that they’ve been violent towards her.”
The report said WD had been placed in residential care and had spent three years cycling through 10 different temporary homes, known as “contingency care arrangements”, which cost the state more than $3m, the report said.
“WD’s experiences in these placements and the instability she faced led to a disruption in her schooling and access to supports. This also resulted in WD increasingly leaving her placement,” the CCYP said.
The CCYP also identified that efforts to prevent WD’s absences from out-of-home care by police, child protection and care providers were “ineffective”, and that she received “insufficient access to forensic examinations” when she attended hospital outside business hours.
The CCYP said while many people and services attempted to do their best to support her, their efforts to meet her needs and reduce the risks she faced “fell short”.
The CCYP made 19 recommendations from the inquiry into WD’s care, including improving the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing’s oversight and reliance on contingency placements and improve responses to child sexual exploitation.
Lizzie Blandthorn, the state’s minister for children, said the CCYP’s report showed more could be done to “better connect services across government for children in care”.
The report also said the CCYP completed 45 child death inquiries – where the minor was known to child protection in the 12 months before they died – in 2023-24. These related to children who died between November 2019 and March 2024.
It outlined the case of a non-verbal Victorian girl, referred to by the pseudonym Layla, who required assistance to be fed and died of malnutrition after child protection closed two of the four reports raising concerns about her health and conducted “inadequate” risk assessments.
She was living at home with her family at the time of her death, the report said. She was non-verbal and had “complex health needs”.
The CCYP found that child protection’s risk assessments were “inadequate” and the department had closed one report without undertaking an “adequate review of risk”. The department also closed another report at intake without “adequately considering key information”, including concerns raised by professionals about Layla’s significant weight loss, repeated hospitalisations and susceptibility to serious illness or death.
“As a result, Layla was left in an environment where her health and wellbeing needs were unmet. This was despite evidence of weight loss and physical harm,” the CCYP said.
In 2023-24, CCYP received 1,892 notifications allegations of child abuse. It represented a 30% increase on the previous financial year and a 136% increase since the first year of the “reportable conduct scheme” scheme in 2017-18.
The increase in notifications was mainly driven from the education sector.
• In Australia, children, young adults, parents and teachers can contact the Kids Helpline on 1800 55 1800, or Bravehearts on 1800 272 831, and adult survivors can contact Blue Knot Foundation on 1300 657 380. In the UK, the NSPCC offers support to children on 0800 1111, and adults concerned about a child on 0808 800 5000. The National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac) offers support for adult survivors on 0808 801 0331. In the US, call or text the Childhelp abuse hotline on 800-422-4453. Other sources of help can be found at Child Helplines International
