Lives blighted as abuse caseload overwhelms CYF

Figures conceal the human cost to children and workers.

Afew years ago when I found myself sick and in self-imposed isolation at home, I started to wade through a bunch of articles and Official Information Act requests (OIAs). Buried in the pile was a set of 20 or more files I had been putting off reading – coroners’ reports for every child known to Child Youth and Family who had died in recent years.

I knew the files would be horrific – the small insight we get into CYF cases told me that much. But there was something else that I wasn’t expecting to see in those files that day.

It was the number of children who had taken their own lives at a terribly young age. It seemed almost as if there were more of them than there were cases of abuse. And the theme that sat behind so many of them was domestic violence.

We talk about domestic violence a lot in politics, as we well should. But it’s easy to lose sight of the people behind the numbers. It was impossible to do that reading these cases – there was the girl who described her home as Once Were Warriors in real life, after her sister took her own life. Or the young woman who, before she died, told police that she did not feel safe at home – there was an 11-year history of domestic violence incidents on record in her family.

The impact of a child watching a mother, a sibling, a loved one – anyone – being bashed and beaten in front of them is something we should all be worried about. It is not just the horror of the moment for that child. It is the long-term impact. Thanks to the work of organisations such as the Brainwave Trust, we know that these events can change the way a child’s brain is wired, putting them in constant fight or flight mode. It affects their ability to learn, to form trusting relationships. It changes everything.

We have the power to do something about this. We know who these kids are. Every time police attend a family violence incident where children are present, they tell CYF. They do it a staggering 57,000 times a year. And what happens to those 57,000 red flags? They fall into the gaping abyss that has become ‘‘notifications for Child, Youth and Family’’.

Don’t get me wrong – I don’t blame social workers for the fact more work isn’t being done with these children and their families. Quite the opposite. I know CYF staff have an incredibly tough job and are being pushed to their limits. I’ve had family members of social workers come to my door to share their stories of stress and breakdowns.

The minister knows the toll this is taking: there were 20,000 more notifications in the past year than in 2009. Labour has been pushing this issue relentlessly but the result is only conversations about ‘‘core duties’’. That debate was laid bare in the recent report on CYF involvement in the ‘‘Roast Busters’’ case, which found the department didn’t have the capacity to intervene, even if it had a duty to do so. Instead, we have a department focused on triaging

The impact of a child watching a mother, a sibling, a loved one – anyone – being bashed and beaten in front of them is something we should all be worried about.

situations where children are in immediate danger, where their lives are at risk. Based on those coroners’ reports, that would mean all 57,000 of these children, but it doesn’t. So, Judith, as you move back into Cabinet I would make one final plea: domestic violence has tentacles that are long and devastating. Yes, we must keep slogging away to bring an end to it in this country, but while we do, we cannot continue to pretend that a child who isn’t hit, is a child unharmed.

The political columns will take a break over the summer.