Governments "fundamentally changing the way" they fund Aboriginal community-controlled organisations (ACCOs) could transform the lives of First Nations children and families.
The findings in a new report from SNAICC - National Voice for our Children argue long-term, flexible investment is essential to improving outcomes for First Nations children and reducing their overrepresentation in the child protection system.
Titled Doing Things Differently: Funding ACCOs to keep families together, it proposes a new funding model featuring guaranteed baseline funding for every ACCO, alongside needs-based funding that reflects community size, location and complexity.
With the latest Closing the Gap data showing the overrepresentation of First Nations children in child protection continues to grow, SNAICC chief executive Catherine Liddle said governments were spending billions responding to children and families only after they had reached crisis point.
"While we have seen an increasing recognition of the important role of community-controlled services, current funding systems continue to be designed for mainstream organisations, creating unnecessary complexity, unnecessary administrative burden, inflexible funding arrangements and chronic underinvestment that limits ACCOs' ability to respond to the needs of their communities," Ms Liddle said.
"This report shows how this mismatch is preventing governments from achieving change at the scale needed and failing to have the adequate services in place to invest in families where it counts."
The report said a growing body of evidence highlighted the role of child and family services focused on prevention and early intervention in improving children's wellbeing.
"While research gaps remain, the evidence clearly indicates that ACCOs are best placed to deliver community-led and culturally safe child and family services that meet the diverse needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities," it stated.
"This is because ACCOs' holistic model of care, alongside their strong connections and responsiveness to their communities, supports better outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and their families."
Despite the evidence, the report argued current funding models fail to recognise the strengths of ACCO-led services or respond to the needs of communities.
"Current funding models do not reflect the true costs of holistic, culturally safe and community-led service delivery," it said. "This makes it more difficult for ACCOs to create the conditions for their service, workforce, communities, children, and families to thrive."
The report made seven recommendations to guide implementation of the proposed funding model:
- Prioritise self-determination by funding Aboriginal community-controlled organisations as leaders in service delivery.
- Develop a nationally coordinated funding model led by the Australian Government in partnership with states, territories and ACCOs.
- Implement the new funding model across all jurisdictions to strengthen ACCO child and family services.
- Embed the model in federal grant programs through reformed funding guidelines and assessment processes.
- Increase investment in prevention by recognising the long-term value of funding ACCO-led early intervention.
- Ensure long-term sustainability by addressing historic underinvestment and supporting growth of the ACCO sector.
- Regularly review and expand the model to respond to changing community needs, workforce growth and service demand.
Ms Liddle said implementing the recommendations would allow governments to deliver immediate and lasting reform, describing the report as a "practical roadmap" to support families while keeping children safe and connected to culture.
"If governments are serious about Closing the Gap, they cannot keep funding the same systems and expect different results," she said.
"They are wasting money and continuing to damage our children and families."
