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C-BERSS EX-PRESS
October 2003
Issue 3, Vol 6
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All Newsletters : October 2003 : Senate Inquiry into Children in Institutional Care
Senate Inquiry into Children in Institutional Care
Our Submission On Your Behalf
The institutional experiences of C-BERS clients will be considered as part of the current Senate Inquiry into Children in Institutional Care.
In our last edition, we reported that a Senate Committee was conducting an inquiry into the quality of care received by children who, for various reasons, have lived away from their family home in institutional or foster care in Australia.
As well as investigating whether children living under such arrangements have been subject to abuse or neglect, the Committee has been asked to examine the long-term social and economic impact of such childhood experiences, both on individuals and families, and on Australian society as a whole.
The Senate Committee Inquiry has been taking submissions on these issues and will report by the end of the year completing a trilogy of inquiries which began with the inquiry into the Stolen Generation, followed by the inquiry into Child Migration and, now, this final part of the trilogy.
On behalf of all our clients, the C-BERS management committee and staff have made a submission to the Inquiry outlining some of the longer term consequences that the institutional experiences of former child migrants have had on their personal, family, social and economic wellbeing as adults.
In making our C-BERS submission, we have drawn on and brought together the many stories our clients have shared with us over the years (although no-one has been personally identified).
The C-BERS submission highlights, in particular
the damage to former child migrants who experienced early childhood abuse
factors and services that have helped former residents to deal with these experiences
ways in which abuse in institutional care settings may be prevented in the future.
All of us at C-BERS hope that the Senate Inquiry will help to bring to public attention the unique problems associated with institutional care, both past and present, as well as providing recommendations that will ensure that children who are unable to live with their families of origin receive the best of care from here on in.
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