Family Group Conferencing in Australia
Introduction This critical analysis looks at the innovative practice of Family Group Conferencing (FGC) in the social work practice area of child protection. FGC refers to family-led decision-making processes seeking to achieve better outcomes for children and young people in contact with child protection officials (Harris 2007). It is a strength-base model originating from New Zealand that has spread into the child protection arena across various Western countries including Australia (McArthur & Winkworth 2006). In FGC, the decision-making process provides the child or young person, their immediate and extended family members, their child protection officials as well as other members of their community concerned about the family with the opportunity to convene, deliberate, and develop strategies to address the care and protection needs of the child or young person in question (Boxall, Morgan & Terrer 2012).
Social work setting In looking at child abuse statistics around the time of FGC’s introduction to Australia, there had been a considerable rise in number of notifications of child abuse and neglect on a national level from 73,000 (1992-1993) to 92,000 (1995-1996) (AIHW 1997). Of the notifications from 1995 to 1996, 11.6 out of 1000 had been subjected to finalized investigations and 5.8 out of 1000 (33%) were substantiated notifications (AIHW 1997). Of substantiated notifications, 31% were substantiated as emotional abuse, 28% as physical abuse, 25% as neglect and 10% as sexual abuse (AIHW 1997). In the child protection arena, issues regarding the needs of care and protection of children “at risk” have long been recognized as complex and requiring collaborative relationships between authorities and families in order to achieve more positive outcomes for the children and their families (AIHW 1997). Therefore, the protection of the child may require the involvement of various services with the child as well as the family (AIHW 1997). In examining the
Social work setting In looking at child abuse statistics around the time of FGC’s introduction to Australia, there had been a considerable rise in number of notifications of child abuse and neglect on a national level from 73,000 (1992-1993) to 92,000 (1995-1996) (AIHW 1997). Of the notifications from 1995 to 1996, 11.6 out of 1000 had been subjected to finalized investigations and 5.8 out of 1000 (33%) were substantiated notifications (AIHW 1997). Of substantiated notifications, 31% were substantiated as emotional abuse, 28% as physical abuse, 25% as neglect and 10% as sexual abuse (AIHW 1997). In the child protection arena, issues regarding the needs of care and protection of children “at risk” have long been recognized as complex and requiring collaborative relationships between authorities and families in order to achieve more positive outcomes for the children and their families (AIHW 1997). Therefore, the protection of the child may require the involvement of various services with the child as well as the family (AIHW 1997). In examining the