These offenders are often manipulative and abuse can go undetected for a large amount of time.
Teachers, police officers, doctors, welfare workers, anyone who works directly with children, are mandatory reporters of abuse.
Due to an unmanageable overload of reports DoCS has changed their mandatory reporting from 'risk of harm' to 'serious risk of harm'.
While this means serious cases have priority and are more likely to be attended to with more haste, the professionals reporting possible abuse usually only have a few indicators to go by.
My concern is many abused children will be overlooked until their circumstances escalate.
Rarely do children verbally disclose abuse.
Children rely on adults to notice physical trauma, emotional and mental disturbances and changes or perhaps developmental delays and abnormal behaviours.
So if one of our only methods of reporting abuse is failing us, what can we do?
If a child is being abused at home are they being informed about their right to live free from abuse?
I would love to see programs in early childhood centres and schools that inform children of their rights.
It would be ideal to give children a voice.
For them to be able to stand up and say 'this is happening to me and it's wrong' rather than hoping that someone will notice, furthermore, actually do something about it.
Do these children all know that what is happening to them is abuse?
Depending on the age and cognitive ability of the child, and the nature of the abuse, this can often be unlikely.
A child that is being abused emotionally may only see physical or sexual abuse as 'abuse' and their parents constant verbal abuse that diminishes their self worth may be explained away as 'i am bad' for example.
Let's not just give children rights.
Let us equip them with the power to ensure they have their rights met.
What strategies do you think could be implemented?
