A former state coroner and victims' rights commissioner say the death of a six-year-old Adelaide girl from suspected neglect was history repeating itself and not enough had been done to improve the child protection system.
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It comes as the ABC was told by those who know the mother that they had reported their concern for the health and wellbeing of her children to the Department for Child Protection (DCP).
The Minister for Child Protection Katrine Hildyard has been contacted for comment.
Ms Hildyard has been in a meeting this morning to be briefed on the investigation.
South Australian police have established Taskforce Prime to investigate whether six children living at a home in Munno Para have been criminally neglected, following the death of a six-year-old girl.
Paramedics rushed the girl to the Lyell McEwin Hospital during the early hours of Friday morning after she was found unresponsive at her home. She died soon after arrival.
The girl's death is being treated as a case of criminal neglect causing death, a crime which carries a potential life sentence.
Her five siblings, aged between seven and 16 years, have been removed from the home. Police say they are investigating criminal neglect charges relating to the children.
Multiple inquiries into child protection, victims advocate says
Former commissioner for victims' rights Michael O’Connell said there had been multiple royal commissions and inquiries in South Australia into the neglect cases of four-year-old Chloe Valentine in 2013 and the murders of Korey Lee Mitchell, 5, and Amber Rigney, 6, at Hillier in 2016.
“Here we are, yet again, discussing the squalor in which children were living and most tragically it has taken the death of a child for people to act,” he said.
He said the community needed to overcome “that notion that the sanctity of a family is beyond our reach” and others have no responsibility to intervene.
“We need to eliminate the obstacles so people feel confident that if they come forward and report incidents of child abuse … that there will be action and that action will be taken immediately, so that we don’t end up with more children dying,” he said.
“There are people who live next door to children every day who are being abused who turn their back to their responsibility of contacting an authority.
“Even if they have, there are times when those authorities don’t respond appropriately, and I think that leads to the ultimate betrayal of the needs of those children.”
Former state coroner Mark Johns who has recommended sweeping changes to the state’s child protection system over the years as part of multiple coronial inquests into the deaths of children said he had lost hope he could change the system.
He told ABC News he poured his “heart and soul” into his findings and recommendations following Chloe Valentine’s death and he did not believe there was anything more he could say – or recommend – that he had not already been recommended.
Mr Johns said he felt like he “didn’t get listened to before”.
Police Commissioner Grant Stevens said his deputy would hold a press conference about the case later today.
