Existing research findings indicate that young people from state care backgrounds experience higher rates of substance use and misuse than the general population. This study explored the nature of this relationship via semi-structured, qualitative interviews with four young people who had recently transitioned from state care and three workers in the out-of-home care field, plus a focus group with seven out-of-home care and leaving care workers. The findings suggest that a range of individual, interpersonal and systematic factors contribute to problematic substance use. They include the use of self-medication to address past and present trauma, a lack of meaningful and stable relationships, and state care policies and practices that lead to young people experiencing premature and unplanned exits from state care. Some significant implications for policy and practice are identified.

Children and young people placed in out-of-home care often present with a range of complex and challenging behaviours that place significant stress on carers and other individuals involved in the placement process. The need for practical support, including the facilitation of knowledge sharing opportunities to better support carers and other health care professionals in assisting children and young people in out-of-home care, is of particular importance within the Australian context. This paper is the third in a series of four papers exploring a range of challenging behaviours that may be evidenced in children and young people placed in out-of-home care. The paper focuses on aggressive behaviours in children and adolescents and outlines a working framework to assist carers in responding appropriately to aggressive responses within the out-of-home care context.

This paper argues that having child-centred policy is not the straightforward matter it might seem. After presenting some historical snap-shots to demonstrate that children have frequently been the victims of policies aimed at addressing needs or perceived problems which are not child-centred, the author argues that contemporary policies frequently leave out significant variables, and the impact of culture is one of these. Focusing on the Australian-Asian region, the author notes the dominance of family and community over individual rights in many countries in our region. The likelihood is that family and children's services in Asian countries will conceptualise services to families and children in non-western ways, in spite of the fact that the principles underlying child protection which they espouse are frequently western in orientation (that is, they have a child's rights focus). Using these insights as a lens through which to look back at Australia, it is possible to see Australia as having ‘cultural’ traditions which also value family and community over the rights of children. It is argued in conclusion that future policy needs to take such realities more firmly into account, and given the increasing presence of and influence of cultures with a family-centred focus in Australia, greater attention also is needed to our international context.

This paper presents findings from a recent research project that provided an opportunity for the voices of a special group of young people to be heard. The biological children of foster families have rarely been the focus of foster care research. Their stories are used in this study to highlight individual experiences and, ultimately, to inform the practice of offering support to foster families.

Twenty-two young people between the ages of nine and thirty-two were interviewed. Their stories told of life in a confusing and contradictory world of foster care. This paper presents, through the words of the young people, four essential themes that highlight these contradictions. These are: sharing and losing; being responsible and escaping; caring and resenting; shouting and keeping quiet. Recommendations are made to improve training and support to foster families.

Becoming a parent and mother is ‘the irreversible crossing of the boundary from being someone's (daughter) to becoming someone's mother’ (Schmidt Neven 1996) and what we know of this transition for adopted women is still primarily anecdotal. Many women adopted during and after the 1970s in Victoria are still in the parenting life stage, and this paper describes the experiences of three of them. The women participated in qualitative, in-depth interviews that were part of a Master of Social Work research study

This article primarily takes a life course approach in eliciting themes of normative family experiences, delay of identity consolidation until the time of childbearing, the impact of search, reunion and divided loyalties, and the negotiation of multiple family systems (adoptive, in-law and birth). The management of these complex phenomena have demanded a high level of skill and effort by these women as they cope with their own emotional reactions, continue to be responsive mothers and assist their children and partners to negotiate new, extended, family relationships.

The study draws attention to and provides insight for practitioners in this hidden area of welfare and indicates the need for further research.

In the middle of the nineteenth century, Australian responses to children in need were significantly influenced by the belief that such children posed a threat to society. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, child welfare legislation states that ‘the best interests of the child must always be paramount’ (Children, Youth and Families Act 2005, Victoria). This paper surveys some of the local and overseas influences which directed child welfare practice and policy towards a philosophy in which the wellbeing of the child is central. It suggests that the concept of the child's personal welfare influenced the understandings of welfare officials long before the term ‘best interests’ was widely employed, but also that this transition in thought did not necessarily correlate with marked improvements in the outcomes for children within the welfare system.

This paper considers the development of the idea of children's rights, firstly at an international level, and then nationally and locally. Focussing on the central ‘right’ as defined by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) – that ‘the child … should grow up in a family environment, in an atmosphere of happiness, love, and understanding’ – the paper points to a contradiction implicit here between the child imagined as a rights-bearing individual and the child imagined as in need of protection, by the family and, if necessary, by the state.

Child protection is a specialised field but it appears that few studies have attempted to define and explain the competencies, such as self-awareness, self-management and relationship-building, that are fundamental to child protection work. This paper suggests that the construct of emotional intelligence provides a useful framework for articulating these key areas of competence in child protection. To this end, a model of emotional intelligence competencies and associated skills is proposed. Workplace strategies for developing emotional intelligence in the context of child protection are then explored. These include reflective supervision, with its emphasis on thinking, feeling and doing, and interactive training exercises.

New Zealand currently operates separate doors and different entry pathways for people wishing to adopt, foster or offer permanent care for a child. This presentation outlines the work now underway to develop a unified application, preparation, assessment, training and support system for applicants wishing to care for a child, whether by adoption, guardianship or as a transitional (foster) caregiver. Placing the child at the centre, One Door uses a framework comprised of six core attributes for parenting a child not born to you; safety; attachment; resilience; identity; integrity; and support. A challenge for the One Door design team will be the application of the model to the family/whänau caregiver whose entry into the care system is, in the main, through necessity not desire.

The ‘best interests of the child’ is rhetoric often applied and to an obscure legal concept. Nevertheless, it remains one of the most important standards, if not the most important, to be applied when attempting to determine what might be the interests of children at law. But as might be the case with other supposedly fundamental principles, there is much ambiguity in the meaning and uncertainty in the application of this principle and the standard it presumes to impose. Not surprisingly, many questions remain unanswered. Firstly, what exactly is the paramount status of the best interests standard? Secondly, in deciding the best interests of the child, does the ultimate responsibility lie with the judge or does it require some judicial deference to community values, as presumably expressed in the legislation? Lastly, does the standard, as it stands today, run the risk of being so general that its application can easily be distorted? Indeed, given the inherent difficulties in articulation and application of the standard, it might be unrealistic to expect mere legal provisions to ease social and emotional tensions that exist in the realm of child welfare today. As children themselves generally do not make applications to the court, their interests inevitably will be dependent on those of other parties, such as parents and the various professionals who assist them. As long as these principles are sought to be upheld in a system which is philosophically and practically adversarial, our ability to promote, maintain and protect the best interests of children will be inhibited. Is near enough good enough … or is it just the best we can do?