ChildStory – Horror Story - Public Service Association

ChildStory – Horror Story

ChildStory – Horror Story – March 2018 (PDF version)

The nightmare continues for child protection workers at Community Services. FACS refuses to acknowledge ChildStory has not accomplished the main purpose for its introduction. Instead it has resulted in child protection workers spending most of their time trying to work around all the pitfalls and deficiencies of this system.

“It cost over $120 million of tax payers’ money and we are worse off”, “we are spending more time trying to deal with this broken system than looking after the children that need us”, “let us do our work” are some of the messages child protection workers want FACS to hear.

FACS is well aware of the magnitude and severity of problems but its response has been painfully slow and inadequate. FACS had been told implementation would result in serious problems – not only by the PSA but also their own people. There has been an obvious failure in contingency planning and an absence of any risk assessments.

As a result, to fix the problems FACS is “Robbing Peter to pay Paul”. FACS is taking staff directly from the front line for up to six months to help fix this mess but has no contingency for backfilling these frontline staff. In the meantime their frontline colleagues, already under immense pressure, are left to pick up the work. Yet FACS can afford to spend countless millions of dollars on private consultants.

Child protection workers are furious FACS has chosen not to spend the money to backfill colleagues’ positions while working on ChildStory support.

The introduction of ChildStory has proven to be a disaster for FACS child protection workers as they are seriously impeded from being able to do their work. They find themselves tied to their computers grappling with a failed system. They certainly don’t find themselves freed from their computers and spending more time with children and families – as promised by FACS Secretary, Michael Coutts-Trotter.

Blacktown CSC walks out to demand action now

Blacktown CSC is the latest CSC to stage a lunchtime demonstration to exert pressure on the Secretary and the Minister to dedicate additional resources and staff to fix ChildStory as a matter of the utmost urgency.

Our members are committed to the children and families with whom they work. They will not sit silently by while FACS Head Office, the Secretary and the Minister continue to either ignore, downplay or dismiss their concerns. It is time for some honesty, transparency and ACCOUNTABILITY!

Related Posts

Back To Top