Welcome to the year of 2014, which will no doubt be as busy as ever for us all. This year we hope to bring you some different content in the journal including a ‘Themed’ Issue in June that will focus on Family Inclusive Child Protection Practice.

Has child protection in Queensland suffered from a risk-averse approach? The recent Child Protection Commission of Inquiry found that a risk-averse culture was one contributing factor to systemic failure in the State’s child protection system. Somewhat paradoxically, such an approach to child protection work can bring its own risks for children and young people. This commentary considers this and asks us to consider what a less risk-averse approach might look like in practice.

Childhood, its stages, purpose and duration are matters of ongoing debate in many contemporary societies. Much of the debate centres on the interpretations of childhood as a time of being, becoming or a combination of both, with the varying perspectives compounded by the rapidly evolving information age of the 21st century that offer children access to more unregulated information from multiple sources than at any time in history. As such, the adult community is confronted by a conundrum: prepare children for their future or preserve childhood as a time romanticised and defined by freedom and carefree living. In order to advance a policy and research agenda, whereby adults and children can share their expertise, a clear understanding of the contemporary societal view of childhood is necessary. This paper presents the views of a range of adults regarding children between the ages of 8 and 12 years old, the tween years.

This article reports on a qualitative study of Australian parents’ perceptions of their children's reactions to a military deployment as well as their help-seeking behaviours. Thirty-eight in-depth interviews were conducted with 34 Australian Defence Force (ADF) parents and 33 non-deployed parents (67 participants). Twenty-nine interviews were with couples and nine were with individuals. The findings revealed that this group of children generally fared poorly in terms of physical and mental health, and behavioural outcomes. Children and adolescents had a number of needs which were not identified, assessed or treated, and prevention programmes were reported to be limited. Factors that are associated with positive and negative outcomes from the families’ perspective are outlined. The data showed how developing a deeper understanding of military families’ needs, as well as positive worker–parent relationships, would enhance the therapeutic alliance between parents and service providers. Implications for prevention and intervention approaches in relation to both policy and service delivery are outlined.

The family service work environment has been linked to the parent–worker relationship (relationship) for many years. However, there is still much to understand about how the working environment and these relationships are connected. This paper reports on a small-scale qualitative study exploring the story of eight relationships between parents and family workers in four rurally based family services in New South Wales (NSW), Australia. Hermeneutics provided a way of examining the dynamics of the relationships, as it enabled an in-depth exploration and interpretation of the participants’ perspectives of how they experienced and understood the relationship. It became apparent that the work environment is an important influence on the relationship. New insights that emerged include the important role that staff not directly involved in the relationship (such as other family workers, supervisors, and administration and other professional staff) may play in assisting relationships. They also include the way in which flexible service delivery options support parent feelings of comfort, readiness to change, reciprocity, a sense of ownership to the service and need for support outside of planned appointments (both during and after intervention has ceased). These all support the development and maintenance of such relationships.

In the past 20 years, social change and expectations for both maternal and paternal responsibilities have highlighted the need for services for families to better understand the role of a father in family relationships. In Australia, as well as internationally, there have been many contested understandings about what constitutes ‘good fathering’ in research, social media and in the political sphere. More specifically, there has also been an emerging trend to understand the challenging task of recruiting and maintaining men's involvement in child and family services programmes, particularly those fathers who are deemed a risk to children and mothers, violent or have been separated from their children. That many child and family/welfare services have exercised dedicated effort to work with fathers is still a relatively recent phenomenon, and has only emerged following criticism that services have been too geared towards working only with mothers. Despite this increasing interest, there is still ongoing need for more research to be undertaken in Australia. An important area of focus is the views of professionals about their perception and engagement of fathers, particularly the views of fathers who are described as being absent from family-based services. The purpose of this article is to report briefly on a study undertaken to examine how child and family welfare workers engage fathers in their work. First, this paper will describe some of the social and health benefits to fathers and their children, focusing on the key role of attachment through play. Research into effective service delivery involving fathers will then be presented, concluding with key practice factors necessary for fathers to be involved in family life.

Children who experience ongoing abuse, violence and homelessness often develop social, emotional, health and behavioural problems which are frequently manifested in trauma-based behaviours including self harming and suicidal behaviours, aggressive and criminal behaviours, and drug and alcohol problems. These children often do not engage with traditional therapeutic services. Their persistent fear associated with fleeing the violence and their subsequent transient living situations prevents them from engaging with professionals.

An innovative therapeutic program using animals in an activity based group setting was implemented by a family violence housing and support agency to engage these children. As part of its commitment to improving responses to children this agency funded a preliminary, independent evaluation of the program.

The objective of this evaluation was to obtain feedback from the children who had attended the group on their experiences of the animal therapy group. This paper reports on the children’s views of the benefits of the group.

“. . . .and when we’re holding the animals, makes you feel more calmer and stuff” (13-year-old girl)

The aim of this study was to explore the role that professional foster care – and specifically Individual Packages of Care (IPC) in South Australia – plays in providing an alternative care option for young people who are unable to live with their birth parents due to issues of abuse or neglect, but who also, due to behavioural concerns, are not well suited to a traditional foster care placement. Participants in the study were nine young people who had previously lived in an IPC placement. The findings highlight participants’ experiences of living in the context of an IPC placement, experiences that were at times challenging, but which also provided opportunities for growth and positive change that may not have been possible in a traditional foster care placement.