Page 1284 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 11 May 2021
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• referral to services; and
• mediation work with families and/or carers;
(e) there is a growing national consensus that support for care leavers needs to include the option of remaining in care until age 21; and
(f) the Government has committed, through the Parliamentary and Governing Agreement for the 10th Legislative Assembly, to improve the extended care system for 18-21 year olds in the out of home care system;” and
(2) Omit paragraph (2) and substitute:
“(2) calls on the ACT Government to:
(a) commit in principle to support the extension of care to age 21 for any young person who wishes to remain in a supported care environment after they turn 18;
(b) explore options to enact a presumption that the continuum care subsidy automatically extends to young people up to at least 21 years of age, including for those exiting residential care and those unable to remain in a foster or kinship care placement;
(c) explore legal options to provide statutory provision for this presumption in the Children and Young People Act 2008;
(d) explore ways to improve data collection on young people who have exited care to support robust evaluation of post-care support services; and
(e) report back to the Assembly on the progress of this work by the last sitting day of June 2022.”
I thank Mrs Kikkert for bringing this motion to the Assembly today. It is, indeed, a very important issue. The ACT has historically led the work, nationally, in relation to transitions from out of home care to adulthood. Mrs Kikkert mentioned a paper that was prepared as part of the National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children 2009-2020—Third Action Plan, which was prepared by ACT officials as some of the jurisdictional leaders in this work in 2018. I table that discussion paper for the information and benefit of the Assembly:
National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children 2009-2020—Third Action Plan 2015-2018—Discussion paper—Transition from out of home care to adulthood: Mapping legislation and policy across Australian jurisdictions, dated December 2018.
That paper demonstrates that in 2018, at the time that the paper was drafted, the ACT was ahead of most other jurisdictions in Australia in the support and care that was provided, including financial support for young people from the age of 18 who were exiting their care and protection orders. As Mrs Kikkert’s motion notes, and the government’s amendments expand on, the existing supports are available to young people who are leaving out of home care when they reach 18 years of age. Home Stretch, a coalition of a large number of organisations with an interest in supporting young people and families in the out of home care system is one of the key advocates for extending support to age 21 at the national level. I met with Home Stretch in
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