Essential Baby blogger Amity Dry
Lately every time I read or watch a news report I am left feeling so despondent about the state of the world I don’t know where to begin. I despair about children starving in Africa, I despair about children being put in detention and shipped off to Malaysia, I despair about children rioting and looting shops, I despair about children growing up surrounded by drug addiction, poverty and helplessness and I despair about children being the victims of abuse both inside and outside their homes.
Were things always this dire, or do we just hear about it more now? And is it just me, or does it feel like things are rapidly going to crap?
One of the stories that has me feeling depressed today is the findings in the “For Kids’ Sake” report, authored by Sydney University Professor Patrick Parkinson and released as part of Child Protection week. The report paints a dire picture for Australian families and states that the situation facing children today is "deteriorating at an extraordinarily rapid pace".
It warns of escalating child-abuse notifications and more children forced to live away from home, with the numbers of children in out of home care doubling in the last 10 years.
It also reveals increasing rates of binge drinking, self-harm, risky sex and mental-health illness in Australian teenagers, with the number of women aged 15-24 hospitalised for acute alcohol intoxication nearly doubling in 10 years, a 90 per cent rise in the hospitalisation of 15 to 17-year-old girls for self-harm and thousands of children using anti depressants.
They are indeed sobering statistics.
The report also portrays a child-protection system in a permanent state of crisis, with at least 13 different inquiries into child protection services across the nation since 2002.
"The numbers of children in need threaten to overwhelm state and territory child-protection departments," Prof Parkinson says.
So what’s going wrong, and where do we start to fix it? Well, controversially this report lays much of the blame at the breakdown of the traditional family unit. Which is perhaps not surprising, seeing as it was commissioned by the Australian Christian Lobby. And this isn’t the first time blame has been laid on the rise of fatherless families, with much of the conservative commentary on the London riots focused on the lack of male presence in children’s lives.
But clearly it is about so much more than that. Shouldn’t the focus be on children receiving stable, loving, engaged and consistent care from parents and extended families, rather than what those families look like? Undoubtedly this should include the stable presence of members of box sexes, so children have role models to aspire to and learn from, but that presence can take many different forms. Wouldn’t it be great if, rather than the report be used to criticise single parent families or condem gay marriage, both the media and Government focused on the other questions it raised?
In the report Prof Parkinson makes 14 recommendations, including increased government funding for parenting classes and counseling, and establishing "community trusts" to receive donations put towards supporting families. He also wants a review into whether government support such as the baby bonus is providing "perverse incentives to choose family forms that may not be optimal as a context for raising children".
Now they are discussions worth having. I have thought for a long time that the baby bonus should be contingent on doing a parenting course, with it paid in installments as you attend the classes. As well as the basics these courses could include information about early childhood brain development, where parents gain an understanding of how the brain pathways are formed and how crucial a positive environment is on a child’s future mental, physical and emotional wellbeing.
It could also cover subjects such as first aid, post-natal depression awareness, breastfeeding support, healthy eating, how to settle a baby, how to play with a toddler, how to manage moments of stress and anger and how to access support when you need it. There is not a parent alive who knows all that before they start and those having subsequent children can always learn more.
The old adage about needing a license to drive a car but not to have a child is thrown around a lot, but why couldn’t we change that? You may not be able to make the courses mandatory, but you could certainly link them to payments.
There are so many avenues of support out there for families in crisis and I have seen first hand the fantastic work many of them do. But unfortunately many of them aren’t utilised by those who need them most. And when they are it’s often court mandated so they don’t lose their kids, so they go into them resentful and on guard. But if these courses got to parents at the start maybe, just maybe, they could have an impact.
It’s certainly worth trying. Because I’m sure we’d all agree we have to do something to change these terrible statistics, for all of our sakes.
What factors do you think have contributed to these sobering statistics and what would your solution be to address them? Let’s play a game of ‘If I ruled the world’ and have a discussion on what can be done…..
Comment on Amity's blog.
